Autumn Skies
by AlwaysCastle
Summary: The effects of the decisions these two make in the next few hours, will force their individual strands to twine together. They will live with the understanding that their worlds will forever be linked by the product of their choices. AU
1. Prologue

_**Prologue**_

In New York City, a man and a woman wake from a night of restless slumber. They lead different lives... and yet they are universally interconnected. Their unrelated lives are bound by the same string of cosmic relief, despite the complexities life has thrown at them. They are unaware that soon their lives will intersect in a matter in which neither will expect. We are bound by our choices.. in such a way, that if we were allowed to go back and change one thing, however small, or unimportant, our entire lives as we know it would change.

There is an order to things, and whether we make our own decisions our not, it's the results that could perhaps define us. Whatever it may be, call it Fate, or Kismet...the effects of the decisions these two make in the next few hours, will force their individual strands to twine together. They will face the toughest of choices and the greatest of triumphs, but more than anything, they will live with the understanding that their worlds will forever be linked by the product of their choices. Lives defined by their own free will...

And it's without this knowledge that the woman turns over in bed. Away from the unwanted warmth beside her to stare off at the window, with it's curtains drawn. Only a small bit of light peaks through, and she's never felt more anxious for a new day. A new start. She looks over her shoulder at the form beside her. And although it's deliciously warm where she lays, the body she shares her bed with gives her no comfort, nor stability his arms once held for her... making it that much easier to slip out of bed and into the chilly air of her bedroom.

Her bare feet hit the cold wood floor, and she curls her toes, cringing lightly with a shiver. Wrapping her arms around her bare shoulders, she walks on the balls of her feet to the bathroom mere feet away, and relishes in the soft rug in front of the sink.

"Oh, Kate," she sighs as she shakes her head at her appearance. Her green eyes stare back. Dull, even her flecks of brown have lost their spark. She feels haggard as she pulls at the blackish skin under her eyes. Pure evidence of her insomnia and lack of any kind of relaxation.

Her brown hair lays limp and lifeless around her face, and she tucks it all behind her ears, feeling the greasy texture. She makes a face in disgust, and leans closer to the mirror. Blinking a few times, she just stares at herself. This unidentified woman. Who is she these days? With everyday the past few weeks bleeding into the next, she thinks she's lost a bit of herself along the way. She really doesn't know anymore. And she's too tired at the moment to find out.

A sound from her room startles her. She freezes, fingers tense at her cheek bones, while her eyes snap to the doorway. She listens, hearing the bed springs and then a groan, then nothing. She lets her hands drop to the sink with a sigh before glaring at herself over her small panic, and then tip toes to the door to shut it. She's back at the sink. Listening for more sounds, and then refocuses on her reflection. Her hands grip the counter with white knuckles as she leans in until her nose touches the cold glass. Her eyes unfocus and refocus, but she still looks the same. The same over-tired, over-worked Kate. But she won't change that. Her job is everything, and anyone who's been around her should know that.

And yet...

She sighs. Closing her eyes for the briefest of moments as if to gather herself, and then spins around to turn on the shower. She pulls a soft green towel from her closet. Holding it to her face, she breathes in the smells of fabric softener. For some reason it soothes her for the moment, making her eyes close involuntarily. It's the building heat and steam of the shower in the confined space that wakes her. With another sigh, hopefully the last one for the day, she climbs in and hopes that the stress of her life will stay itself behind the wall. She gets into the shower realizing after a moment that it's highly unlikely.

* * *

><p>He stirs, the cosmic pull of events still unknown to him as he wakes. He turns over blinking his eyes up at the ceiling. The little bit of light peaking in from the window, casts a sharp line across his line of sight. He swings his arm out beside him, finding it empty and he's still unsure about how he feels about it. Whether he prefers the cold space his hand finds, to the body that use to fill it. He brings his hand back to rest on his stomach under the sheets, wishing he could stay in bed all day. Feeling like it's almost not worth it. Almost. But he does eventually, and reluctantly he slips out from under the space only his warmth provided and out into the cold air of his bedroom.<p>

His bare feet hit the cool floor beneath, aiding in the waking up processes as he makes his way to his bathroom. Rubbing a hand over his face, and into his messy brown hair, he soon opens his eyes to his tired reflection. He leans in a little closer.

"Wake up, Rick," he demands of himself, slapping either cheek, trying to shake the sleep from his wary mind.

His blue eyes stare back, less piercing, not condoning the fun loving man he's supposed to be playing. When did this happen? He narrows his eyes, his hair falling in a mess over his forehead. He grimaces, as a feeling of discontentment washes over him and he rubs at his growing stubble. He wonders if it will ever change, if he can find that man he's wanted to be. But somehow he's gotten lost in all the jumbled expectations.

He hears a sound from upstairs. He pauses, his hand still on his scruff, while his eyes look towards the door. He listens, hearing a running feet, a small laugh, and then nothing. He lets his hand drop to the counter, with a sigh of relief before staring down his bleary image at his small panic. He pads to the door, closing it to a crack, and then turns back to the mirror. He stays still for another moment, and when nothing further filters through the crack in the door, he grips the sink. He looks, stone faced at himself, waiting for... something. But nothing happens. He still looks like the same emotionally and physically tired Rick. And some of that might change. He has something very dear to him, that depends on him a great deal.

His everything...

He sighs. Closing his eyes from a small moment, as if preparing himself, and then turns around to turn on the shower. He gets a soft blue towel from the closet, holding it to his face. It feels nice against his face, wrought with insomnia. It soothes him for the time being, until he breaths it in. It smells like her... He growls, throwing it onto the counter before stepping into the steam of the shower already fogging up the mirrors. He hopes that the small amount of time he will spend in here, will fog up enough of his brain to help him cope. But as the scolding water bites at his skin, he doesn't find that likely.

* * *

><p>Her curtains are pulled back when she walks out of the bathroom in her soft towel. Droplets cling to her skin, chilling in the air of her room, and rising goosebumps on her flesh. But the sun warms her on her way by it to the bed. The bed is empty with the covers drawn back so far it irritates her. She grits her teeth, hearing him banging around in the kitchen, and goes about her morning ritual. The smell of cherries fills the space around her as she stands at her dresser. Pulling out a few articles of clothing, she throws them onto the bed before she ties her hair up into a tight bun, so tight it hurts.<p>

She lets her hands rest forcefully on the top of the dresser with a sigh. She just can't help it. Wishes this day would be over. And it's early. First bad sign of the day... When this part of her life is over and done with, she needs to do something to get some of her control back... or maybe lose control...just something, anything to make her feel more alive and less suffocated and claustrophobic. That's what this relationship feels like these days. Weighing her down and drowning her in the unknown instead of making her feel happy and free like it used to.

She wipes a hand over her eyes, needing coffee to help with that last bit of drowsiness, and opens her small jewelry box. She delicately removes her mothers ring, ducking her head to place it over and around her neck. The cold metal rests against her skin, sending a shiver though her body, as if she can feel her mothers' presence. Kate stares at the ring resting there through her reflection in the mirror, taking in deep breaths and then dropping her eyes back to the box. Her fathers watch. She fastens it around her wrist and then dresses for a long hectic day at work.

She holsters her gun at her hip, opening the door and leaning against it as she lifts one leg, pulling on her heel, and then the other. All the while looking at the floor and avoiding him all together. But once her foot meets the ground, heels on and ready for work... He can't keep quiet anymore.

"Are we going to talk about this?" he asks as she walks past him to pour herself a cup of coffee.

She takes a long sip, staring out into the living room. She cradles the hot cup to her chest with both hands, the flesh of her palms nearly burning. "There is nothing to talk about, Will." Her voice is even. Having thought about this to the point where she wants this to just stop. Be over so she can move on. Even though her speedy process won't make it any less painful.

She looks over her shoulder at him. He's standing with his own cup in one hand, the other outstretched and resting on the side of the fridge. "Kate," he protests, hand slipping down as he steps closer.

She takes a step back, staring at his chest clad in a black FBI t-shirt. It's her favorite shirt. She eternally shakes herself. "No, you are going to take that job, it's a good opportunity, and I won't keep you from that." His hair sticks up adorably, and she resists the urge to go to him, and feed her fingers through it.

Will sighs. He knows how stubborn she is.

"Bye, Will." Kate turns away from him, placing the cup into the sink and walking to the door for her keys and coat. Her heels click, sharply, like her tongue when she speaks to him.

"Kate, come on." He sounds defeated and yet still tries anyway. His attempts are futile.

She spins around, blowing a loose strand of hair from her face in irritation. "We both know I love my job too much to leave." They both also know that this is more about her mothers' unsolved case than anything else.

"Just think about it."

"I have thought about it! God, Will! Just go. Can you please just go? Leave your key on the counter, get your stuff, and lock up on your way out." Without anything further, she swipes her keys from the table by the door and slams it behind her on her way out.

* * *

><p>Rick walks into his room, towel drying his hair as he goes. Throwing the towel onto the floor somewhere, he tries not to look at the empty bed as he steps into his closet. What to wear? Does it need to be sharp? He just wants to swap a pair of dress pants for sweats, and a suit jacket for a t shirt. But he can't. He hangs his choice on the back of the door, pulling on a t shirt for now, and a pair of pj pants. With a grim sigh, he exits his room and into the study. It's warmer in here than in his room, the windows large, inviting in the sun of the early morning. But it's pleasant shine does not alter his current dark mood.<p>

He can hear his mother's door open on the second floor as he takes a seat at his desk. This buys him a little more time to end this. It's over... or at least it will be when he signs the papers. At the moment the manilla folder stares up at him from it's cold place on the desk resting in his laptop. His brow creases severely, as he grabs the thing, opening the annoying little accusing clasp and pulling the papers from inside. He grabs a pen, nearly knocking the cup that holds the rest over, and hovers his hand over the place that demands his signature.

The sound of a small laugh and the gentle sooth of his mother reaches his ear. His heart clenches, and his eyes cast downwards, blurring at the words on the page. What will this do to them? He can't help but go through all the scenarios. This is not one of those things he can fix like in his books. He can't rewrite their story, or create a new ending. It's just one of the many things he has no control over...And he needs to get some of that back. Maybe it's better this way. He knows he didn't do anything wrong... well... not that he knows of. He tried. But maybe it's just her. She couldn't handle them. She's too flighty and carefree to be tied down by anything. But did she have to cheat on him?

"Richard?" He startles. Looking up to find his mother peering around the door.

"Give me a minute," he says, his voice icy, but he hopes she knows that he does not mean it.

She nods her head, pursing her lips and giving him a look of sympathy before ducking back out. He drops his head into his hands. Elbows on the desk and sighs loudly and aggravatingly into his hands. He gives himself just a moment. Thinking about this. And then his head comes out of his hands with determination. There is nothing else to think about.

With a firm nod at his inner agreement, Rick pushes pen to paper, and signs his name on the line without regrets. He crosses the T, and dots the I, before sliding the paper back into the folder with a sense of finality, before getting up from his desk. He grasps the folder in one hand, pushing his hair away from his forehead, and leaving his study. He throws the document onto the kitchen counter, and takes the stairs two at a time.

* * *

><p>Both doors swing open to the morgue, flying violently back as she quickly steps away from them and jumps up onto an empty autopsy table. The ME turns around in her chair, startled. Once she takes in the strained expression of the brunette, she tilts her head to one side and lets her shoulders sag.<p>

"I'm sorry, sweetie," she offers, knowing there is not much else she can give.

Kate shrugs, eyes cast downwards at her fathers watch, which she twists around and around. "Was only a matter of time," she finally says, her voice strong. She looks up, meeting the soft brown eyes of her friend, and shrugs again.

"That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt," she replies, leaning forward in her swivel chair.

"Oh, it hurts alright," she says, an edge in her voice; an underlying rasp with the need to cry behind it.

The ME regards her for a moment. Even though Kate is here for some emotional support... her wall is still up, and she's utterly guarded. That wont change. It's all over her face and in her posture. Stiff back, tense jaw. But it's her eyes that give her away. Tired and defeated. They don't shine like they used to. At least, as much as the medical examiner has ever seen. But she knows that the true light has been missing for a very long time.

"What do I do now, Lanie?" Kate finally asks.

Lanie lets a diabolic grin spread across her dark skin. Flipping her hair over her shoulder, she stands up, walking over and leaning her hip on the table next to Kate. Kate's eyes grow wide in alarm, as Lanie's eyebrow corks up at her own inner amusement. She places one hand on her hip, while the other tugs playfully at the bun of Kate's head.

"Now, we let our hair down."

* * *

><p>"Hi, Pumpkin." Rick holds his arms out for his 7 year old daughter.<p>

"Daddy!" She runs over from playing with her dollhouse, and fixes her father with an adorable smile, arms out yawning. He lifts her up, kissing her little heart shaped face, and smoothing her flaming red hair from her forehead. She laughs as he hugs her to him. A little more than usual. She is all he has now.

"You'll be all right," his mother says from the doorway.

Rick holds his daughter out to fully look at her. His heart already repairing itself. Looking at her now, he knows they can make it. She is everything he's ever wanted. And he never knew it until she was born. This tiny human being he helped create. So what if her mother is too dense to see it. She doesn't deserve this beautiful little girl.

His little girl reaches out a hand, pushing at the hair flopped on his forehead. He laughs, taking in every line of her face, the joy in her eyes. Her blues show him a love he will never receive from anyone else. This is unconditional. It's not stilted, or forced. Her love is innocent and everything that should be right in this world. And he's not going to let the follies of others tare him down, or keep him from loving her all the same.

"I know."

* * *

><p><strong>Rated M for future mature content.<br>**

**A/N This will be something much different then all my other stories. I hope you give it a chance. Reviews are always appreciated! And thanks to Monkeywand for being my beta for this :D**


	2. Chapter One

_**Chapter One**_

Kate can feel the beat in her bones the second her and Lanie step into the club. She's already swaying her hips, and moving her body in time. The lights are low, casting blues and greens over the crowd. Kate smiles over at the medical examiner, who's got this saucy, primal look on her face as she surveys the crowd. Her eyebrows raised, lips pursed as if stiflingly the need to moan at her own expectations. Kate's thinking more along the lines of how easy it would be to get lost in here.

She bumps Lanie at her side and the two hit the bar first, wanting to scope out the place and throw back a few before really letting lose. She sets up on a stool, pulling the hem of her dress down, if you can call it that, and orders a drink. She's wearing a fitting green halter dress, cut low in the back and the thing barely covers half her thighs. Lanie is already flirting with the bartender and hands Kate a drink. The two look at each other, out at the other dancers and patrons looking for a little fun, and then back at each other. They clink their glasses and knock them back at the same time.

Rick has been here about half an hour. He tips back his glass, downing the rest of it and slamming it onto the bar for another. He's a free man as of 1 o'clock this afternoon. And after spending a good part of the day with his daughter. He threw on a pair of dark blue jeans and a midnight blue dress shirt, and then left her with the babysitter. Now he has found himself here.

There is a pretty blonde a few stools down giving him the eyes, but he's not all that interested, like he would normally be. And yes, he may be a bachelor again. But he can't seem to get himself into it. The beat is perfect. He can feel it coaxing him out onto the dance floor, like this blonde seems to be doing with her come hither good looks. But maybe he's not ready yet, or maybe he just hasn't had enough to drink. So he orders another one. His body is relaxing now, becoming less reluctant, and more willing to press up against another body. The idea of it being with a complete stranger perks him up, and he's slightly surprised at himself. This want to just...connect, with a nameless face. Maybe that's the control he was earlier seeking.

Kate has lost Lanie within the first twenty minutes of arriving. She thinks she spots her with a man or two near the middle of the dance floor. Moving between them in her tight blue..strip of fabric, and Kate smiles, loving the beat, and the atmosphere. It's been a while since she's done this, and being newly single means she can hit this scene more often when not dealing with the harsher realities of life. This could be her escape she thinks, as she throws back another shot, and slips from the stool. She's in motion once her heels hit the glowing dance floor, and she finds herself weaving into the crowd with no real destination.

He eternally berates himself.

Get in the game.

He's rich, successful, who wouldn't want him? But perhaps that's the wrong approach. Sure it's gotten him plenty of woman in the past.. including his now ex wife Meredith. But perhaps he needs a new angle... just.. get out there and, what? Just be?

Yeah. He nods at himself. Just go out there and...

He sees her the moment he turns from the bar. He is sure he is seeing the most beautiful creature he has ever beheld, and she's on the other side of the club. Her dress is barely there, and now neither is he. She's moving in sync to the beating of his heart. And something inside him seems to click into place. She appears almost as if she doesn't belong in a place like this... With her angelic face, and gorgeous brunette hair. The way she moves, effortless and free, draws him right in, and he finds himself out of his own stool, and making his way towards her.

She slides her hand up her side, patting her hand to the beat pulsing in her blood. She dips, and rises on her left hip, moving along like an ocean wave into the throng of other dancers. She closes her eyes, moving her head from one side to the other, her hand traveling slowly up, as though a caress from a lover, and into her hair. She pushes it up and over, hand traveling down the back of her head to then slide down to her hip. Her head snaps to one side, eyes opening to see she's been spotted. Probably by more than one hungry guy in this club... but she only has eyes for him.

Her skin is pulsating. Thrumming in her every nerve and waking all her other senses. It's electrifying, this feeling as she almost pauses in her erotic dance. She feels a call, somewhere in her body, be it her heart, her soul, or something more cardinal. But she finds herself wanting to migrate towards the source. Feel it's hum against her inner vibrations.

She looks at him and his heart stops completely. She is stunning and he feels his confidence building. He continues on his way towards her until she is nearly pressed against him, and asks her to dance. It's a wordless question, with an equally silent answer as she smiles wickedly at him, draping a hand over his shoulder, and moving in time to the music. Her body barely touching him, yet close enough to tease. He can feel the heat and passion emanating from her delicious curves. She is an amazing dancer, sexy as hell, and a little bit of a minx. He can't help himself much longer and his hands find her waist as they sway to the rhythm of the music.

She doesn't let the spark his touch ignites show on her face. Instead she lets her eyes wander his face, his stubble, which she's always found unbelievably sexy on a man. His chest is strong under her light touch, and her eyes drink him in. They travel down to his waist, and further on until her eyes come back up. She likes what she sees and so she presses a little further into him, letting the music flow through them as one.

His hand finds her back, while the other stays firmly planted on her waist. The song is upbeat and they can tell there is a spark between them and it's urging them on. He's feeling bold, she can tell from the devilish grin on his ruggedly handsome face. She's not surprised, if not maybe from the force, as he swiftly turns her in his grasp and wraps his arms around her stomach.

Her stomach coils under his large hand, and she turns her head to the side, brushing her hair against his face. Her breathing becomes shallow and now she's pressing back into him at the same time as she dips low, arching her back slightly and coming back up with a sway to the left. Hips connecting with any part of him she can reach. Then to the right. Back up again. She tries to ignore the feeling in her gut. It's more than arousal, more then just the feel of his body moving perfectly with hers. And if she ponders it further, she might get skittish.

Her hair smells like cherries as she presses back into him. It clouds his mind, letting his other senses take over. She's extraordinary under his touch, her body the perfect shape as she moves with him. There is no one else in this room right now, just them. He eyes the dip where her neck meets her shoulder, sees the perfect skin in the dancing lights and tightens his hold, wanting to touch more of her. When her back arches as she comes back up one last time, he takes command, pulling her firmly against him. His hands snake to her sides and run upwards as his hips move in rhythm to the music vibrating from her lithe body. His palms rub down her sides and he feels her shudder against his tingling flesh. When they reach her hips, he moves her as they dance to their own music.

She feels it deep within a part of her she didn't know existed when his hands pull her along to his movements. Guiding her against his body, and she shudders once more, turning her head from one side, to the other, before nearly resting it against his shoulder. She can feel his hot breath on her neck, and her body heats at his touch. Her skin flushes, temperature rising to a near fever, and her heart quickens in time with the beat, his hands slithering over her, and she wishes it wasn't the fabric of her dress he was caressing, but skin. Hot, burning flesh.

This is an all together new feeling for him. Touching this nameless woman in a way he's never touched anyone else. And there are still articles of clothing between them. He closes his eyes, his body reacting, fully aware of her shape pressed into him. When he opens his eyes, he sees her neck is at his disposal, her scent assaulting his nose. She is nowhere and everywhere around him and he needs more. His hands tighten on her, and he already wants to feast on her neck. He thrills at the thought of running his lips across the bumps caused by his breath. And she is letting him lead, so he can't disappoint, can he?

He slowly moves his hands up her body and pulls her hair to one side, tickling her neck. His mouth hovers over her skin, it's radiating heat, and he blows softly on her neck as if to cool her down. When she shivers against him, he lets his lips taste the dip he's been eying. She gasps and grinds back into him. His hands find hers at her side, and together they move as he surely leaves his mark on her.

She bites her lip, holding back a moan, and tilts her head to one side for him to have better access. When she feels his lips at her ear, her hand comes up behind them to grip the back of his head. His hair feels glorious against her finger tips. His fingers find her elbow then snake their way down her body, pressing his strong arm into her and just brushing past her breast. It travels further along her toned feminine form, his other hand firmly planted on her stomach, as he continues to nip at the delectable skin of her neck. They are both a little light-headed from the alcohol and the heat, but her face is clearly flushed for other reasons. So is his. As his breathing hitches, he soon finds himself in great need of her lips.

She can sense his need at her back, the ripple of his muscles as he holds her like she's never been held before. And he's just some stranger in a club. But he ignites something in her, knotting the need deep and tightly in her abdomen. She needs him like no other, so she spins around, facing him. Her hand on the back of his neck curls in the hair there while she advances. Hips grinding into his, her dark brown-green eyes dart from his brilliant blue eyes to his lips that were just feasting on her neck, back and forth until her hungry eyes linger on his mouth. She licks her lips.

The leer she is giving him could destroy worlds and end wars. He feels no hesitation as his hands find her soft and luscious hair, and he claims her lips with his. She is a maelstrom of emotion and heat, and he struggles to keep up. Her tongue darts out of her mouth and dances with his. The perfect contrast to the movement of their bodies to the forgotten beat of the club and he finds she's taken control now completely. His hands are trying to consume every part of her. Her ass is his final destination though, and it does not disappoint.

She moans into his mouth, tasting his liquor on his tongue as it mixes with hers. She nearly forgets herself as she pulls him in closer, hands yanking him in by the collar of his shirt. She kisses him with such force, it's as though she's breathing him into her. Lips fused to his as if anchoring her down. Fingers digging into his scalp, body melded to his. When she remembers where they are, she loosens her hold on him. Her mouth goes to his ear, and she pulls his lobe between her teeth before whispering.

"My place or yours?"

More beautiful words have never been spoken. He shivers at her purr, her obvious bedroom voice but he doesn't want this to be a one night stand. As they lean back, his eyes capture in hers and he just has to have this extraordinary woman. Her place...women love their first encounters with a new man in their own bed. And she can't run from him if they go there. He pulls away from her, takes her hand as he leads her out of the club and into the night.

* * *

><p><strong>Thoughts?<strong>


	3. Chapter Two

**For clarification purposes, I went back and put Alexis at 7, Kate is at least 26, and lets say Rick is 32. **

**Thanks to Monkeywand for being my beta for this:D**

* * *

><p><em><strong> Chapter Two<strong>_

They hit the bed, both frantic and unhurried, reveling in the taste and smell of each other as hot seeking flesh finds it's twin flame. His hands grab hers as he hovers over her, his mouth finding the spot on her neck that he's already learned drives her wild.

As her heart beats with his, the music still humming in their bones, she panics, just for a moment. She is much more sober than him, and she almost feels as if she is taking advantage of him... In the comfort his body provides her. She wonders whether this is right. But as his hands slip up her sides, every last shred of clothing gone in a blur of need and want, and something truly undefined... she throws her cares into the wind, and allows herself to completely bask in the feel of his tongue and lips as they suck on those parts of her neck. His presence alone elicits the greatest of moans from her lips. He wants this, just as she does.

They don't speak, both afraid to break the spell. Just move, and guide each other like before. It feels so natural and meant to be. The pull is so much greater in this moment, she feels as if she's floating, and doesn't care if she ever comes back down.

She has always been the one who needs control, who needs to be in charge, and the bedroom is no exception to that rule. But this feels different. This feels so much better. She no longer wants to question it, as she smooths her hands up over his chest. His skin is hot and slick under her touch, and she leans forward, pressing an open mouth kiss to his clavicle before running her tongue alone the bone. She moves upwards until she reaches his jaw, which she nips, and then pulls back with a wicked grin.

He smiles down at her, her dark green eyes swimming in his deep ocean blues. He nearly pauses in those depths, before leaning forward to take one of her breasts into his mouth. The sensation creates an incredible feeling exactly where they should. Her nipples harden as his mouth works wonders on her chest, and her back arches into the pleasure he provides. They are connected, the electricity more a product of them than what they touch.

She needs more. She needs to be closer. She can feel their connection all right, but now she needs to make it more tangible. Feel him as they become one, like on the dance floor. She moves her hands slowly down, igniting flames in her fingertips and surly his skin as he shutters over her. Their chests are almost pressed together, his enticing breath on her face, his breathing residing with hers. The anticipation growing, and they are both nearly there already.

Her arm brushes his stomach until she reaches him. She touches him softly, looking into his eyes as she does so before moving him directly where she needs him. Both their eyes meet, conveying something so primal, and yet so unknown that when he slowly enters her, their eyes close and a gasp leaves both of them breathless. The feeling is incredible, she can't help but moan loudly as she finds a safe haven in him. She can tell he is close, but she gets the distinct impression he is going to wait for her, even in his less than sober state.

He moves into her, with her, like a dance. A Rumba, as they find a sensual rhythm. The crescendo takes them over, diving in each other deeper and deeper. He feels her gasp again, and a tremor rocks her body into his. Her nails dig sharply into his finely toned back, trying to anchor herself down on a wave he's made for her. She claws him, creating red welts that he won't feel or care about later. His mouth finds her neck as he continues his slow and steady pace.

She inhales sharply when he pulls himself up a little, whimpering softly and she bites down on his shoulder when he suddenly sinks in again, slowing his pace. He growls, lifting his head from her neck. The slow friction of their bodies sends shock waves through her every nerve, and she holds on tighter, her lips finding his when their dance turns into a slow moving waltz.

* * *

><p>She's wrapped tightly in her sheets. It's rich and warm in them, her body draped over her pillows, one arm dangling off the bed, while the other rests behind her, near something radiating a lot of heat. A long, pleasurable hum escapes her mouth as she wakes. Yet, her eyes stay closed and she opens her mouth, smacking her lips a few times and tasting.. what is that? A mixture of alcohol and something purely masculine. She turns her face away, breathing in with a small groan and a sleepy smile on her face. Her body aches in all the right places, and this is the best sleep she's had in months.<p>

Letting her eyes flutter open, she finds the curtains are drawn back. Her greens are met with the blinding sunlight forcing it's way in. Kate pulls her hand from the warmth, shielding her eyes and turning over to then collide with a very firm, very warm body. Kate's hand drops from her face, brushing against flesh of her unknown bed companion. His body rises and falls in slumber under her fingertips when she presses them to his spine. As though making sure he is real. The feel of his hot flesh, rises an awareness in her and she blinks a few times.

Oh right.

The club, the dancing, this delicious man.

The heat, passion...something else completely new, and exciting... and now... here they are.

She rolls onto her back, eyes staring up at the ceiling and every now and then flicking to the nameless guy next to her. His back is to her, and from the sharp line the light casts from the window over his muscular frame, she can see the scratch marks her nails left on him the night before. They are deep, and red, harsh in the light, and she can't help but lift her hands in front of her to inspect them. As if she's going to see bits of his skin under her nails.

How much did she drink last night?

She pushes a hand up over her eyes, thinking as she worries her lip between her teeth. Her throbbing, swollen pink flesh feels raw, and warm. As if she was just fused to this man by their lips, tasting every inch of him. And her body feels as though she had just romped in this bed mere minutes ago.

Her head turns on her pillow to the clock on her nightstand. The time does not really register and she can't seem to care at the moment. Blinking at the shining red numbers, she stares back up at the ceiling and she wonders why on earth she's still lying here, and not kicking this man out of her bed. It's as though she's forgotten who she is for the time being. It's not long before her eyes are back on him. That magnetic pull between them evident once again. She just watches this guy sleep. Whoever he is. He looks vaguely familiar, as she traces the line of his jaw with her eyes, pulling her lip further into her mouth. Her body heat rises, and she closes her eyes.

When she opens them again, he is still there. With her sheets draped over him lazily tucked around his midsection, leaving his lower back and arm in full view of her eyes. The more she looks, taking in his broad shoulder and large forearm, those eyes become hungry. They look downward, over his hip covered by the sheet to his ass, unfortunately also concealed, down to his legs. One is wrapped around her sheet, and she can see her comforter has lost some sort of battle and is lying in a heap on the floor.

Her mind wanders. To the club, his touch, his eyes, those looks, the heat... Oh, the heat. She's never experienced anything like it. And it was all there before they even reached this last destination. Tangled in her bedsheets.

Her phone rings.

Kate startles out of her haze as she jumps out of bed, wrapping a sheet around herself and pulling it along with her. She searches frantically for the damn thing, tripping over what she is sure is his pants in the hallway before stumbling into the kitchen and finding her coat draped over the counter. She fishes her hand inside, and pulls it out.

"Beckett?" she says breathlessly, survey her surroundings.

"Girl!" Lanie's excitable voice filters through loudly.

Kate cringes and pulls the phone away from her ear. She spots her bra on the door handle to the closet and she wonders how on earth it got there. "Shh!" she hisses into the phone, chewing on her thumb nail.

"I knew letting your hair down was a good idea!" the saucy ME sing songs.

Speaking of hair. Kate runs her hand through it, getting her fingers caught in multiple knots, and then gives up. "Yes.. uh...hmm." Kate closes her eyes for a moment. She clutches the sheet tighter as it slips, and bits and pieces of the night before enter her mind.

"So, who is was that guy I saw you leave with?" Lanie then asks.

Kate opens her eyes, which land on the door leading out of her apartment. She nearly gasps at the memory. How they were all teeth and tongue in the elevator, hands everywhere and then fumbling with the lock as he nibbled on her neck. And then when they finally got inside, he nearly took her against the door.

"Earth to Beckett."

"What?.. oh.. I don't know." She grins at herself. Self satisfied for some reason.

"You don't even know his name! Oh, Girl!" Lanie shrieks.

"Shh!"

"He's still there? You know.. .I saw you dancing with him.. and then leave, hastily I might add." Kate can almost hear her eyebrow raise deviously. Lanie continues. " And he sort of reminds me of Richard Castle."

Kate eyes her bedroom door, walking on the balls of her feet to peer around at him.

"You know... the novelist?" Lanie prompts when Kate says nothing.

She's too busy staring at his bare ass. He has shifted in his sleep, and the rest of the covers have fallen to the floor. "Huh?" Her mouth is agape, remembering how he felt cupped in her hands as they...

"Rich-ard Cas-le," Lanie enunciates. "Are you still drunk?" she then asks, amusement dripping off her tongue.

"No." Kate turns away from the naked man in her bed, her finger at her mouth again. "I hardly had anything to drink.. I was.. dunk on..." She looks over at him again, his face has turned towards her now and his mouth is partly open. Her face flushes, her neck tingling. "Something else." Her brow creases in thought as she stares at this mans face.

And then she's padding quickly to her book shelf and pulling the first one of many out. She stares at the back of the book. Her mouth dropping open as she's again moving swiftly through her apartment, trampling over her dress and falling into her doorway. She lifts the book up, eye level with the man in her bed. Her eyes grow wide and she nearly drops the book.

"Lanie!" she hisses. "I slept with Richard freaking Castle!"

Lanie laughs. "Who are you and what have you done to Kate Beckett?" she then asks.

"I don't know," Kate replies, the book now cradled to her chest.. "But she's slowly returning. I'll see you in a little while."

"How are you going to get him ou-"

Kate hangs up. She rests the phone on her lips, staring at _The_ Richard Castle, butt naked in her bed, and then to his clothes thrown about her apartment. It was definitely a ravenous battle of two bodies trying to connect in the most cardinal of ways...and more.

Her face flushes, and her legs weaken at the knees.

What to do, what to do?

She's shaking now, not sure if she's going into shock or not. She finally moves from the door, picking up his clothes with shaking hands. She stands next to her bed arms full of Richard Castle's clothing... her favorite author the man who...

She tightens her hold on his clothes and resists the urge to smell them. Like some fangirl, and then throws them into a pile next to him before forcing herself away from the temptation to slither back into that bed. To wake him up properly... she shakes her head, inwardly cursing herself and swiftly turning away with a heavy sigh to get into the shower.

* * *

><p>Rick awakens at the sound of a door slamming. He groans, slapping a hand over his face as he pushes his right cheek further into the pillow. He hums, pulling it into him, hugging it. It smells so good, it's intoxicating. Just like her; this woman he still doesn't know the name of. But he feels like he knows her. He certainly <em>knows <em>her, but he finds he wants more. So much more, and he doesn't care if he just got divorced.

Rick Castle realizes when he's had something good, and once he's had it?

Well...

He turns onto his back. His other arm comes out, expecting to touch soft curves and warm flesh. Instead he is met with a nearly cold spot. His eyes open to the ceiling and his head snaps to the side. And then three things register at once. One. He's hung over. Two. He's alone in that extraordinary woman's bed. And three...he is pretty sure she just walked out her door. He's also sure, that she won't be coming back.

His hand comes off his face, and he sits up. He should have heard the shower click on, or at least some light breathing beside him. Yet, he hears nothing.

He groans again, his head pounding. How much did he drink? More than her he thinks. She seemed incredibly confident of herself as she yanked him by the shirt collar back to her place. Luckily it was only a block from her apartment. They almost didn't make it. She was just so...for once in his life.. he has no words to describe this mysterious women.

But one thing he does know. Is that he wants to solve her. Later...yes later. Because right now he is freezing his naked ass off in someone elses' bed, he's got a raging migraine and he has to get home to his daughter.

Now where are his clothes? He turns to the side of the bed, feet hitting the floor and looks around. He almost laughs when he sees she has thrown them onto the bed next to him. Seems like something he might do, though that hasn't happened in a while. He finds himself smiling, as he pulls his shirt on, starting to button it up as he thinks about her nimble fingers unbuttoning this shirt. The look in her eyes...

He wonders what she was like when she woke up to him in her bed. If she knows who he is, and if perhaps that scared her. She didn't seem to know who he was last night. Didn't ask him as she whispered in the only words of the night to him. Her voice dripping with seduction.

_My place or yours?_

He shivers. And then shakes himself, pulling on his pants and standing up.

For only a moment, he is hesitant. Should he take a shower? It's unfamiliar and it feels like it's intruding, but he has seen her naked. So there is that. No, he needs to get home to Alexis, he needs to go be a father after one night of being something else. Something he is not sure he wants to be again unless it brings the women he just shared an incredible night with, whose heavenly scent is all around him, back to him again. After a small pause, his mind on her face, the sexy birthmark on her right cheek, and that hair... he finally snaps out of it and rushes through getting ready, the same clothes that smell like alcohol, cigarettes, and the potent scent of cherries.

He thinks about leaving a note, as he makes her bed...maybe leaving his number, but he isn't sure that would be wise, given the strength she used on the door. He got the distinct sense last night...

Oh, God, last night...Wow.

That mouth... If he ever did brag to his poker buddies, or the guys at the gym or at the bar, he is certain this would be the story he would tell. He isn't like that though, so he will have to settle for the glorious memory of what she did to him last night. What he did to her...

Oh, God... He closes his eyes when he reaches the front door. His hand rests on the wood and he can almost feel their heat emanating from it. Feel her lithe body pressed into his as he backed her up against it.

He takes in a shaky breath, fisting his hand and pressing his forehead to the door forcefully. He has no idea who she is. All he knows that the vixen he met last night is only one layer to this magnificent creature. She has truly captured him. With her presence, her body, the magnetism and feelings she rose in him. He doesn't know her name or the sound of her voice. They never spoke... but he knows the curves of her jaw, the sharp green of her eyes, the flecks of brown that shone in them when they darkened with wanton. He knows how to elicit sounds from her kissable lips, feel the vibrations in her throat against his own lips as he coaxed them out of her.

There is a sharp intake of breath, his heart beats achingly against his chest...He wants...he wants so badly to reach for her again, the same desire from last night. When he first laid eyes on her in the club... he didn't think it was possible but it's still rising. There is something about the way they connected, first through eye contact, the unspoken word, followed by the cosmic pull. And then of course, the end result, tangled in her sheets. Sure, he is a man, and it's not like woman don't feel the same deep urges. And maybe it seemed like that as they crashed into her apartment. But it was so much more than that.

He feels as though his senses have been honed, since he met her... Taste, touch, and smell... they all have new meaning for him now. And he thinks.. even if he never sees her again... he will never be able to feel this way for any other woman again.

It could be the alcohol or the romanticism, which it is he isn't sure, but the knowledge of Alexis at home brings him around again. Responsibility calls, and without hesitation he answers. Soon.

Soon he will find her again, find the wonder that is this magnificent creature, but for now, he knows that life calls for his immediate withdrawal.

Soon. He will find her soon...

* * *

><p><strong>Thoughts?<strong>


	4. Chapter Three

_**Chapter Three**_

Her pen taps vigorously on her desk as she stares at her computer screen. With every phone that rings in the bullpen, the tapping gets harder and quicker, and the crease between her eyes gets deeper. The lights over head seem way too bright. And the general noise of the area is closing in on her ears, causing this pounding in her head that mirrors the uneasy rhythm of her heart. The murder board stands empty by her desk, and her fellow detectives, Kevin Ryan and Javier Esposito, avoid eye contact with her as they flick a triangle across their desks at each other.

It's quiet... well, in the sense that there is no case, and most of their paperwork is done. So she sits here looking over cold cases. Her cup of coffee, not even half empty, sits on her desk. Not that it tasted any good anyway. But the boys thought she could use it when she came in here all in a huff and sat forcefully in her chair not at all ready for whatever this day would bring.

Kate feels as though her equilibrium has been tampered with, and she can't wipe the scowl off her face. She's been here for two hours, and already she's snapped at the boys and scared a rookie to the far side of the precinct. And what irritates her more, is that she has no idea why she is so irritated. It's not just one thing either. She woke up more tired then when she went to bed, she's starving, but she feels too sick to eat anything, and she just feels...off.

The phone rings on her desk. Ryan and Esposito spin around in their chairs, hopeful looks plastered on their faces as she snaps the phone up. Not that they want people to get murdered... but they haven't had a case in almost a week and they are beginning to feel uneasy. The boys look at each other and then at Kate as she slams the phone back down too forcefully and stands from her desk.

"Case, Boss?" Ryan asks timidly.

Kate turns towards them with a fire in her eyes. "No," she snaps, turning away from them without another word.

She stalks towards the elevator, a few officer's standing in a group talking about who knows what, part like the red sea, and then scatter when she throws them a look. At the elevator she stands tapping her foot with her arms crossed while she waits for the annoying ping. Once inside she sags against the far wall, finally defusing. She stands in a daze, as the floors tick down, and she almost misses her floor when the doors slide open. Her trance carries her down the long corridors until she's pushing through the double doors and into the morgue where Lanie waits.

"You're late," the ME says, arms crossed, stern look on her face.

Kate stops dead, snapping out of... whatever or wherever she's been, and tilts her head to one side. "Huh?"

"What is wrong with you?" Lanie then says, getting up from her chair where she was writing a report.

Kate hoists herself up onto an empty autopsy table, looking down with actual disgust as the ME uncovers a dead woman on the table in front of her. For once in her life, the sight of a dead body has Kate feeling queasy.

She shrugs, staring down intently at the face of Ms. Jane Doe. She has dark black curls, and a pretty face. She looks to be about mid twenties, and from what Kate can see, aside from a bloated abdomen, probably from decomp, there doesn't seem to be an immediate cause of death.

Lanie glares at her.

"I don't know," Kate finally says, looking away from the corpse. The coffee still lingering on her tongue from earlier, tastes more like acid then normal.

Lanie looks up through her eyelashes, letting the sheet rest over the woman's hips. "Are you feeling okay?" She picks up a scalpel, still staring at her friend, hovering her instrument over the graying flesh.

"No," Kate says. "In all honesty, I don't know what's wrong with me." She deflates on the table, feeling as though she might cry. Her wall is completely down and she doesn't have the energy to reenforce it.

"Well," Lanie replies, placing one gloved hand on her hip still holding the scalpel. "How long as it been?"

"Since?" Kate inclines her head, her voice becoming snappy again.

"You know."

"Since I last ate? Since I slept decently, had a case, last had sex - Since I what?" She raises her arms, and then back down on the cold table beneath her. She's exasperated because it's all of the above.

Lanie fixes her with a look. The classic 'Don't sass me' look. "Since Richard Castle walked in and then out of your life, leaving you a hot brooding mess." She now ignores Kate who gasps appallingly, and crosses her arms firmly over her chest.

Kate looks away as Lane makes her Y incision."I don't know, 2 weeks, and three days." She sighs at how she's been counting.

"Mm hmm." Lanie looks at her almost disapprovingly.

"Does this conversation have a point?" Kate asks, pinching the bridge of her nose, and scooting farther down the table, and away from the now open chest cavity.

"Did you use protection?"

At the same time she asks this, Lanie lifts her hands from the chest cavity, blood dripping from her gloves to place something into a silver basin. Kate, flies off the table and over to a sink to throw up.

"Guess not."

* * *

><p>Kate always finds she consults the mirror when something is not right, or she's stressed or just too lost. It's as if she'll find the answers here. Almost like staring at the murder board waiting for something to reveal itself if she stares long enough. And this is no exception as Kate pushes herself into the ladies room when she gets back to homicide. She falls against the sink, gasping for air and catches herself with white knuckles on the cool sink.<p>

Pregnant...with Richard Freaking Castle's baby.

But maybe not...she hasn't taken a test yet. It's just a suspicion...although, her gut is telling her she is. Sometimes her gut tells her more than evidence ever could.

Her chin is touching her chest as she breathes in deeply. And then her gaze slowly rises, her eyes meeting it's twin in the mirror. She can't help that feeling of loss since that night with him, seep back into her. She hasn't been able to get him out of her mind. And it's not just because he's Richard Castle the novelist. Her favorite Author, and safe haven. No. It's much more than that. It runs deeper. On a level she never knew was possible.

She lets herself sink into this feeling for a moment. Go back to how he made her feel... but then, she shakes her head at herself. Get it together. How could this have happened? Well, of course she knows, she's just usually is more careful.. and with her favorite author no less... This must be a dream. Certainly she is dreaming...

The door opens and Esposito pokes his head in."Beckett?"

"Yup?" She looks at him through the mirror, her voice too happy and forced.

He stares for a moment, concern leaking onto his face. "You okay?"

"Fine." She turns around to face him. "What's up?"

"We have a body."

* * *

><p>Kate slams her car door more forcefully then usual, and stands at the car for just a moment. Breathing in deeply, she closes her eyes and berates herself. Just another case. Probably something simple, and then she can go home and figure out her new status.<p>

She nods at herself curtly, opening her eyes and looking across the way at the other police cruisers and yellow caution tape. Ryan is talking to another uniform, and she can vaguely see the outline of Esposito behind a bush. He's talking to someone, probably Lanie. Kate takes in another breath, and walks around a large puddle, her heels clicking on the path to then be replaced with the swish of wet grass.

"What have we got?" She's at least thankful of the steel readiness in her voice, that does not mirror the uneasiness in her chest.

"Don't really know, actually." Esposito uncrosses his arms, and points down. "Our victim is probably mid 30's but we have no I.D just yet, her wallet and purse are missing. Could be a robbery gone wrong, but our vic was pregnant," Esposito says, shading his eyes from the sun with his small notebook.

What are the odds? Not that Kate believes in such things, but she feels like someone is trying to send her a sign. A really messed up, deranged sign. Or it's just a coincidence...

To make herself feel better, she will go with coincidence. But it doesn't help that Lanie is keeping a watchful eye on her, with a look of deep concern and pity. As if Kate's the dead body laying in the park, stomach distended from being very pregnant.

"I'd have to run some more test to be sure, but I would say time of death was between three and seven this morning," Lanie says, crouching down in the wet grass off the path. It had rained the night before, leaving puddles scattered in various places about the park, and Kate can see that Lanie's pant legs are already damp.

But Kate is more focused on her bodies reaction to this case. Her heart is clenching and unclenching painfully, and she thinks she might get sick again. She had just sat down with her coffee at the precinct around seven. And this woman, expecting, lost her life.

"Cause." Kate clears her throat, looking away from the victim. "Cause of death?"

"Childbirth." Lanie replies.

Kate resists the urge to protect her own stomach, and cover her mouth at the same time. "Then why is she in the park, and where is the baby?" She pivots her body, looking around the area of the park. On her last sweep, Lanie stands up. A look suspiciously similar to horror, is etched on her face. It's the look Lanie gets when something doesn't feel right.

Esposito steps around Lanie, and out of the suns raze. "Given the blood, she probably gave birth right here in the park, but there isn't much physical evidence except for the blood near the tree over there." He points off to the right, in the opposite direction of the parks entrance.

Kate follows his gaze, and then back down at the victim. A lump forms in her throat. The deceased has short blonde hair caked with dirt, and she's laid out on her back scrunched a little as if she was in a great deal of pain at one point.

Esposito is still talking. "And clearly there is no new-born. I've got Ryan trying to track down witnesses, but even here, in such a public place, I don't think we are going to get much." He looks sullen. "This is a pretty secluded area of the park, and if she didn't scream or protest, then I don't think we are going to find many witnesses."

Lanie pulls another face, and Kate knows it was meant for her. She has to look away as another pang enters and exits her already quick beating heart. "Alright, let's see if we can find out who the victim is first. Lanie, can you meet me back at the precinct?" She asks the ME, all business now, which makes Lanie raise an eyebrow at her.

Kate turns back to Esposito, "Meanwhile, stay here and get CSU to process the scene and the blood, let's see if we can find something that might lead us to our killer." She turns away from the victim completely. From the sight of the woman's face, once warm, and soft with life.

Kate is quiet for a long time, looking around the park slowly, as if she might catch something they might have missed. Maybe the sound of a baby crying, but she is only met with the common sounds of the park. And the longer she looks, the deeper her heart sinks.

Esposito speaks up when he comes to realize that Kate is otherwise preoccupied. "Yeah, I agree..." He looks at Kate who still has not turned to him, and then at Lanie, with a question in his eyes. " Lanie, can you run toxicology, see if she was on drugs or may have been drugged?" he asks, taking charge now.

"Uh sure…" Lanie stands, peeling off her gloves, and walking over to Kate. She places a hand on her arm lightly.

Kate shares another look with Lanie but thinks this can wait, she moves on to Esposito, "Alright, this doesn't fit with a garden variety mugging, so let's be sure about everything. Meet me back at the precinct when you and Ryan are done canvassing, and we can go over the case there. I'll have the board up too."

Esposito smiles back. "You got it, boss."

* * *

><p>Back at her desk, Kate is bent over with her head between her arms. Ryan and Esposito are not back yet, and she had a hard time getting away from Lanie. It rose suspicion in Esposito at both their behavior, and Kate had to brush it off as just having an off day. Which is a major understatement. But he seemed to take it, to Kate's utter relief. She does not want to talk about this right now.<p>

She pulls her head from between her arms, pushing her hand into her hair and grabbing at her scalp. The murder board is up, with yet another nameless face, and a mystery they all must solve. Kate it trying to wrap her head around it. A woman left in a park, who had died giving birth. Where is the baby? Is the poor thing even still alive?

Kate's phone buzzes, startling her out of her intense pondering. It's Lanie she has some new information. Kate gets up from her chair, hoping that whatever it is will lead them to who this woman is, and where that baby might be.

"Lanie, you got something?" Kate asks as the doors swing open to omit her.

Lanie regards her for a moment, but after receiving a severe look from Kate, she proceeds. "Yeah, I am officially placing the time of death between three and seven this morning," she says in such a way that Kate realizes she's hiding something.

Lanie stands in front of their victim from the park, her eyes staring at the woman's face, but not really seeing. A panic feeling rises in Kate on the look she has on her face. "Lanie," Kate says softly. Lanie looks up, her eyes glassy. "What is it?"

Her face is grave and haunted. "You remember that body I had this morning?" She asks.

Of course Kate remembers, she nods her head.

"Well..." She looks Kate in the eye. "It occurred to me at the crime scene as soon as I got there." She pauses again.

Kate's heart rate quickens for the hundredth time today. "Lanie?" Her voice is shaky and uneven.

"She had also been pregnant, recently..."

"What are you trying to say?" She's not even masking her own building horror.

"Baby, this is so much worse than we could possibly imagine."

* * *

><p><strong>Yes, I know this seems like another Kate is pregnant fic.. but please bare with me.<strong>


	5. Chapter Four

_**Chapter Four**_

Kate stares at the ME.

"I found the cause," Lanie says, walking around the new victim. "You see these little bruises on the side of her face?" She gestures to them and Kate leans in. There are several purple and bluish marks on either side of the victims graying flesh. Kate's gut turns. It's not like she hasn't seen this before on countless other cases. It's just.. this one hits close to home.

She eternally steals herself. "Yeah, she was strangled?" Her brows furrow, and her eyes skitter over the woman's face.

"Yes, she must have been really out of it too because she didn't fight back at all. She has no defensive wounds on her hands or face." She lifts a hand from the table, while looking at the woman.

Kate's eyes follow and then her head tilts to one side. "Out of it?" The terrible feeling rises further the longer she listens to Lanie's findings.

"Yeah, she was given an anesthetic and delivery was induced." Placing the hand back down, Lanie walks around the table again and points at a needle mark on her hip.

"Wait..wait…so your saying that someone anesthetized her, induced labor, and then killed her?"

Lanie nods gravely.

Kate steps away from table, one hand curling over her mouth while the other goes to her hair. She paces a few times thinking until she turns to Lanie. "They must have wanted the babies, which means this is a baby napping operation." Her voice gets whispery and bridging on terrified. " I need everything you have on the other vic, alright, Lanie?"

"Already done. Here are the files, hopefully this can shed some light." Lanie pulls a file from her desk and passes it over to Kate.

"Alright, anything else?" she asks, wanting to just get the hell out of this room, away from these dead women.

"Three things." She steps away from the vic that just came in, walking over to the freezers and pulling one open. Out rolls the woman from this morning. "She doesn't have any signs of abuse."

Kate's eyes snap down to the woman, and her brow furrows even deeper. "Then how do you know these two are connected? It could just be a coincidence," Kate asks, but she knows she is grasping at straws from the way Lanie shifts her head away from her and purses her lips.

"Because they were both found in parks." She points down at her vic. "She was found in Morning side Park. _And_, she was induced, just like your vic from Bennet Park."

Kate's mouth opens and closes. "And the drug?"

"Pitocin. It's one of the most commonly used drugs for inducing labor." Lanie then gestures at the file white knuckled in Kate's hand, which Kate opens and reads. When she sees the tox screens are a match she nearly faints.

Lanie must see this, because she walks over and touches Kate's arm soothingly before going back to the other victim. "Last thing, I've pulled the prints off her face and we are running them now, as we are with our other vic, but it would help if we had someone to compare them too."

"You mean they didn't wear gloves?"

"Well, the person who killed her didn't, but I think the person who delivered the baby did. And again, that's exactly true for vic number two."

"Thanks Lanie," Kate says with a far off look on her face and a barely audible voice.

"Hey, please be careful, girl. This one hits far too close to home, especially given your condition." Her eyes drift to Kate's stomach.

She resists looking down and sighs. "I will Lanie, I promise." She turns to leave, her hand on the double doors.

"You still haven't told them?" Lanie's voice is softer now.

"I just…" Kate turns back around. "I won't for a while. I mean... I am not even sure myself."

"Mmhmmm…" Lanie crosses her arms and gives her the signature knowing look.

"Don't mmhmmm me. I know what I am doing!"

* * *

><p>Kate steps into the elevator, the doors closing as her body sinks into itself. Her back hits the far side and she curls forward, both arms wrapped around her abdomen. What if she is growing another human being inside her? Does she really want to bring them out into a world where other people kill each other and sell babies to twisted people who either have no idea, or don't care about how they got them?<p>

The elevator dings before she has time to think further, and Ryan and Esposito are actually standing on the other side waiting for her.

"It's worse than we thought," Kate says, running a hand through her hair and walking to the murder board.

Ryan and Esposito stop and look at each other with equal worry before they run to catch up with Kate who is already writing down the time-line. "What do you mean?" Ryan asks, sitting on the corner of her desk.

"What have we got?" Esposito crosses his arms.

"It's a baby napping operation. They used general anesthesia on both the woman to-"

"Wait, both?" Esposito uncrosses his arms and Ryan's brow raises, blue eyes concerned.

Kate caps the marker and turns towards them. "Yes, Lanie had a case this morning." She pulls it from under her armpit and hands Espo the new case file. "A pregnant woman, and when we got this new vic, she thought it seemed familiar. After running some tests it turns out _both_ woman were pregnant, and both were induced with the same drug."

"So." Ryan stands up and moves to the board. "The kidnappers knock them out, induce, and then take the babies..."

"And then they kill the mothers," Esposito finishes.

All three fall silent in horror.

"But where do they take the babies?" Ryan asks.

"And who are these woman?" Esposito points at the two photos, the latest one Kate just put up from the new file.

Kate chews the inside of her cheek, her hand coming down unconsciously to her stomach. When she realizes what she's doing, she clamps her fist and rests it on her hip."I pulled the case from the first investigative team and the captain has assigned us the case." She points at the file she gave Espo. "After speaking to Hotchins and Aarons, they confirmed that the cases are connected and they have turned over everything they have on the first case. If we need them, we will talk to them, but I want to run both the first and second case together. Have you run her through the system?" she asks, pointing at the latest vic.

"We are now, so far no hits. What about this one?" She looks to Esposito who holds up the file and then back at the board. She bites her lip, staring at the two woman.

"Still nothing." Her hand comes up to her mouth in pondering.

"What about the drug?" Ryan pipes in after a short silence. Or perhaps it was longer than she thought.

"Pitocin." She says, without looking at him. Her eyes scan both pictures of the victims, trying to find a connection. " I doubt we would get anything off of that, Lanie says it's one of the most commonly used drugs for inducing labor."

Both of her fellow detectives faces fall.

"Would you like a coffee, Beckett?" Ryan asks.

Kate turns her head, her eyes softening at the kind Irishman. "No, but thanks Ryan... Can you two go check with canvas? Maybe see if they found a wallet or any form of ID in the park?"

"On it." Ryan gets up and goes to his phone.

"I'll just let you..." Esposito gestures towards the board, and then walks off in the direction of the break room.

She lets out a sigh, falling back into her desk and balancing on the edge. Kate rubs at her face, obscuring the victims from view for a moment so she can gather herself.

* * *

><p>Kate pops a small piece of chicken in her mouth from a container next to her. She's been lost in thought. Both on the case and her own current state. It's not that shes doesn't want kids. She just never thought it would be like this. And alone. She wont go looking for Richard Castle to tell him either. Like he would believe a word she says anyway. He was more drunk then she was and probably doesn't even remember what she looks like. She's a fighter, she can do this on her own. Somehow. But she should really be positive first. She just hasn't the time to do so. And Lanie will be on her ass about it soon. It's just this case...it scares her more than any case ever has.<p>

And these woman...to find out they are going to have a baby, maybe they were scared at first, like Kate. But then they got excited about it, picked out colors for their babies rooms, picked names. But then this happened. Completely morose and twistedly unexpected. How did this happen?

Kate frowns deeply. She's been staring at the board for over an hour and still nothing. The canvas came up empty, aside from figuring out the the woman was not killed at the park, but somewhere else and dumped there almost immediately after her death. And the blood can be explained from the extra fluid from the pregnancy. On top of that, nothing on either prints from the women, or from the marks on the second victims neck. Along with no matches in facial recognition.

"What am I missing?" Kate whispers to herself, setting her fork down and getting up from her chair.

She gets closer to the board, her eyes scanning time of death on both, to where they were found. But then there was the question of, where was her baby? Both victims were found in two different locations. Not even near each other. And yet, both were pregnant, and both were induced with the same drug.

How else where these two connected? How did the kidnappers choose them? It's then she sees it...maybe. Ryan walks up, holding a bottled water out to her.

"Shhhh," she says, putting her hand up.

"Yo, Beckett," Esposito calls from his desk.

Ryan gives him a look, and then Esposito gets up to join them. The two stare at Kate as she looks almost excitingly and unsure between the two photos before pulling them down and taking a better look.

"What do you see?" One of them asks.

"I'm not sure...but it could be something." She hands them each a photo.

Ryan squints at it. "What am I supposed to be looking for?"

"Look at their clothes."

"What about them?" Espo asks next, looking over at Ryan's photo and then back at his.

Kate pokes a finger at both woman. "They are torn, and ragged."

The two male detectives stare at Kate. Both getting these looks on their faces as if they are trying to grasp at whatever she's getting at. Kate sighs, snapping the photos back up. "Why would their clothes be torn? They weren't running, they were induced. And why would pregnant women be wearing such tattered clothing?"

Ryan and Espo look at each other and shrug.

Kate rolls her eyes slamming a finger down on one vic. "And why aren't they in the system? Or at least missing persons." She raises her eyebrows at them, waiting.

"You think we are looking in the wrong place?"

"Yes! I want you guys to take these down to the local homeless shelters. These woman aren't missing, because no one is looking for them."

* * *

><p><strong>Thoughts?<strong>


	6. Chapter Five

_**Chapter Five**_

When Kate is alone with her thoughts again, she lets a small smile seep onto her face. Miniscule, because it's only a tiny lead. But hopefully it's something. They had checked with hospitals around the areas both woman were found for any newborns that might have been brought in. It was highly unlikely, and of course there was nothing out of the ordinary.

She hopes the babies are all right...She can't imagine what type of person would do such a thing... and seeing as this is a baby napping operation, the babies will be kept healthy. For twisted families who will spend the money for them...it's despicable.

Kate leans back in her chair, looking down at her stomach to place both her hands there. If there is a baby Beckett in there, Kate will do everything in her power to keep them safe. She just needs to be sure. She can process this better when she has either a negative or a positive to look at.

"Beckett."

Kate startles, her hand flying off her stomach and onto her chest. She looks over her shoulder to see Captain Montgomery with his head around his office door.

"My office." He disappears.

Kate frowns, but gets up from her chair, hands dropping to her sides. "Sir?" She asks, stepping into his office.

The man in question sits at his desk comfortably. That steely look on his face that she knows is really just a cover. An act to make his fathering less personal. "How's the case?" he asks.

She stares at him for a moment, wondering why he's asking, and then sighs. "Slow going. I have Ryan and Esposito running down a theory. I should hear back from them soon," she replies trying to sound more hopeful then she feels.

"Good." He's silent for a moment, regarding her. " And you, are you good?"

"Of course." She tries not to clench her jaw or show any indicators.

He nods once. "You seem off today, that's all."

She steels herself. Does he know? Is she being that obvious?

"Just this case," she says running her hand through her hair for better effect.

The older man nods again, seeming to take it. Kate's phone rings and when she goes to open her mouth, he gestures her out the door. She thanks him and steps out.

"What have we got?"

" First vic, Melody Fisher, twenty-eight, was recently homeless when her husband died in a construction accident only a month ago. Her home was foreclosed and she had no next of kin." Esposito fills her in.

Kate places a hand over her mouth walking to the murder board and staring at the picture of Melody. All alone in this world, and pregnant. To have lost her husband, her home, and then this? Kate gives Melody a moment of silence, before uncapping her dry erase marker and filling in the information under her name and photo.

"And the second?" she asks, dropping her attention to the other unfortunate.

Ryan pipes in with the sound of rustling paper, "Olive Garber, Thirty- two. She's been without a job and home longer than our first vic. They both stayed at a woman's shelter in Manhattan on west 46th between 6th and 7th Avenue, called St. Mary's Episcopal."

Kate writes the other woman's name down, feeling a lightness at this new information, but just a little. It's something, but not everything. She wants to bring down the sick bastard who did this.

"Olive's been in and out of various homeless shelters, although she frequented St. Mary's Episcopal Church more often than not. She was hiding from domestic abuse. Her boyfriend a..." She hears the flipping of paper. "Colin Wentworth."

"Check him out," she grits out.

Both make a sound in agreement.

"She's been hiding out for a few months. Father Julian, the shelters supervisor said it was not uncommon for some of the women to just not show up for a while, so he hasn't thought much of these two's disappearances."

"Thanks." Kate's brow creases. "Okay, other than they frequented the same woman's shelter, what else can we dig up that can link these two?" She looks between the two, the smell of the dry erase maker making her feel queasy again.

"Well," Esposito takes his turn. "There is more than one pregnant woman in that particular shelter, and they all go to the same Doctor."

"The Woman's Health Free clinic, also in Manhattan."

"Where?"

"On 16th street."

"Run by a Dr. Pierce McHale," one of them says but she's too excited to pay attention.

"Alright." She caps the marker. "You two go find Olive's ex boyfriend, bring him in for questioning. And I will go to see this doctor.

She hears the ignition. "We're on it."

* * *

><p>Her heels click on the asphalt as she walks across the small parking lot to the main entrance of The Woman's Free health Clinic on 16th Street. The sound, is a sharp contrast to the mush she's feeling on the inside. Her limbs wobbly and her stomach in knots. But the harsh click is a great boost of confidence as she pulls the door open. She's met with baby blue walls of a small sitting area. The usual smell hospitals are known for is evident, along with posters of pregnant woman and different stages of fetuses growing in the womb. Her mind flicks to her own for a brief moment, her eyes on the very first stage and wondering if this is going on right now inside her.<p>

One woman sits in the corner reading a magazine. She rests it on her large stomach and hums happily to herself in the silence of the room. Kate walks around a ficus to the front desk where a African American woman in her early thirties, sits snacking on some grapes and looking at something on the computer.

"Can I help you?" the woman asks, not looking up.

"Yes, you can," Kate says, staring at the woman, reading the tag on her salmon scrubs that just reads 'Simone.'

"Do you have an appointment?" Simone looks up to be met with Kate's badge.

"I don't think I need one," Kate replies, all business.

"What can I do for you, detective?"

"Is Dr. McHale in? I have some questions for him," Kate asks placing her badge back at her hip with her service piece.

Simone sits back in her chair blinking and then looks towards a close door to the left. "He's with a patient right now but he should be available after that. Is there anything I can do for you in the meantime?" she asks sweetly.

"Maybe you can, do you recognize either of these woman?" Kate pulls out the two photos and pushes them across the counter.

Simone takes them, a flash a familiarity in her eyes. She looks back up at Kate. "Yes, Melody and Olive. Are they okay?"

"No, they were murdered, and their babies were taken from them," Kate says, trying to stay professional.

Simone's hand flies to her mouth to cover a gasp. "Who would do such a thing?" she whispers in horror.

"That's what I am trying to figure out, if you know anything, please let me know."

Simone nods her head several times, and wordlessly hands Kate back the photos. Kate turns away, seeing the woman across the room quickly look back down at her magazine. She has one hand splayed protectively on her stomach, having heard everything Kate said. Kate stares at the space over the woman's head, to the poster. From the look of the woman, she appears to be in her 35th week. 8 months pregnant, with a full grown baby in there. Kate's eyes flick to the first month. If she calculates correctly she could barely be into her second week. As her eyes are about to skip to the other weeks, the door opens near the front desk. Kate turns around to see a woman exiting. She's barely pregnant, or not at all from what Kate can see, but looks can be deceiving.

"I will call you as soon as I get the test results back," an older man says. She can see half his face and graying hair as he stands in the open doorway, one hand on the woman's arm.

"Thank you," the woman replies with a nod and a hopeful smile.

"Simone, can you put down Jane for another appointment in a few weeks?" he asks kindly.

"Of course," she says, tapping a few things on her computer before speaking again, "Dr. McHale?" He looks up from checking his watch. "There is a detective here to see you." She points at Kate with her pen, and the doctor looks around at her.

"Can I help you?" he asks, his voice deep, matching his kind face.

Kate walks over to him and hands him the photos. "Do you recognize these woman?" she asks even though she knows he does. It's just the tedious routine.

He takes a look at them and then gestures her into his office. "I'll be with you in a moment, Iris," he says to the only woman in the waiting room. She nods her head with a smile and he turns back to Kate. When the door is closed he takes a seat behind his desk with a sigh. He sets the photos down on his desk, and looks down at them with his dark green eyes. From what Kate can tell, he looks troubled.

"They were your patients," she says, more than asks.

He nods. "Something happened to them," he says. It's not a question but a somber statement. As though he expected it.

"They were murdered," Kate replies, watching him. His face stays stoic, but his eyes show everything. "And their babies were taken," she adds.

His face falls considerably and he takes in a breath. Pushing the photos a cross the table to Kate, and he finally looks at her. "I feared for them," he says finally, voice grave, "When they both hadn't shown up for their appointments. Olive was scheduled to be in here last week, and Melody was due in today."

Kate takes this in and then has to ask, "Where were you Tuesday between two and eight pm, and Thursday between three and seven am?"

He looks at her like he expected that too and leans back in his chair. " I was here Tuesday with appointments. You can check with Simone, I am sure she can verify. And Thursday I was delivering a baby at Cedar Sanai around seven that night until well into the early morning. A baby girl, born at nine thirteen, seven pounds and six ounces," he replies kindly, his eyes shining at the memory of the birth before his kind face becomes a bit hollow from being accused of doing such a thing to these woman. It's only natural, but Kate has to read into everything as though he is a suspect. And for now he is all they have.

"I'll be sure to check with her."

"If that is all, I have another appointment waiting for me," he says getting up.

She takes this as her cue to leave, and swipes the photos from the desk as she stands up. "Call me if you have anymore information," she says, stepping out of his office and handing him her card.

He nods to her, looking over at Simone, and then gesturing Iris into his office. Kate leaves the clinic feeling as though she has gotten nowhere once again. Of course she will run his financials and his alibi. For now Kate gets into her car, and heads to the morgue to see Lanie.

* * *

><p>Colin Wentworth checks out. He moved across the country over a month ago, and hasn't been back in the states since then. His financials also don't show any suspicious activity, if not only confirm his whereabouts the date of his ex girlfriends murder and his baby kidnapping. He didn't even care. And Kate had wished he had done it. Then at least she could stick his sorry ass for a human being in jail for something, other than being abusive, and even that was not completely knowable.<p>

Now, Kate sits at home, worrying her lip between her teeth and clutching at her scalp as she stares at the pregnancy test strip sitting mysteriously on her living room coffee table. If this doesn't confirm it, Lanie's test will. Kate had gone in after meeting with the doctor to see if she had anything on the fingerprints.

Nothing. Of course.

It was then Lanie kept giving her that look, and she didn't have to ask, before Kate gave in and let her do an anonymous test, with the instructions to take a home pregnancy test and get off her feet because she's been at it all day. And stressing out her mind and body about this case. Then there was the question of Richard Castle again. Which she argued with Lanie for almost half an hour about contacting him and telling him he very well could be expecting a new child. Not that they didn't know he doesn't already have one with his now ex wife. But Kate can't bring herself too. No matter what. Not that she believes in such things.. but maybe there were only supposed to share one amazing night together. And then go off to their own, separate lives.

They have completely different lives, and statuses. He's a famous Author, and she's just a NYPD detective. He's a writer and she's a.. well she doesn't know but she's at least tried to convince herself that it wouldn't work. And the answer on the test staring back at her confirms it. She sighs, snapping it up from the table, and throwing it into the trash before going into her room, and curling up in bed after a very tiring day.

* * *

><p>Kate pushes through the double doors with the news on the tip of her tongue. The ME whirls around from her desk, holding a sheet of paper in her hand and an odd expression on her face. Kate stands frozen in the doorway, her arms out wide holding both doors ajar as she opens her mouth at the same time as her friend.<p>

"I'm Pregnant."

"You're Pregnant."

* * *

><p><strong>Please leave a review :D<strong>

**btw.. _Once Upon a Crime_? Great fucking episode.  
><strong>


	7. Chapter Six

**So I had this chapter all worked out around chapter four. And I only just typed it up now because I have been sick. Thank you for being patent, here is Rick's POV.**

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><p><em><strong>Chapter Six<strong>_

His office is dark where he sits at his desk. The window, which is open, lets in the cool January air that feels more like spring then the dead of winter. It's been so mild, Rick has a feeling this whole "in like a lion, out like a lamb," will be full force come March. He's not looking forward to it, that much is for sure. In fact he hasn't looked forward to much of anything...

He sighs, his feet up on the desk, laptop in his lap with a blank document and blinking cursor. He stares at the TV in the corner of his office. He's been waiting for more news on the baby-nappers who have been dubbed not affectionately as The Deliverers. It's sickening, he thinks the things people can do to each other in real life as opposed to what he writes. And most of his stuff is prompted by what he sees and hears from the world around him. He turns the TV up to a higher volume as he frowns at the indecency. The TV blasts his ears, his attempts to drown out his melancholic thoughts are only temporarily replaced as the news woman appears on the screen.

"Evidence in the case of The Deliverers, a group a criminals who are randomly abducting and killing women for their children, shows that the murders are well planned, methodical, and sadistic. We have here with us today, Detective Beckett..."

He flicks of the TV off just as his mother walks in.

"You have got to stop moping around, Richard!" Martha scolds as she starts collecting empty coffee cups and glasses with tiny amounts of scotch left in them.

He tries to ignore her as he stares out the now black television screen. "I am not moping, mother," he replies, although his rumpled appearance says otherwise. His hair lays disheveled over his forehead and he's been wearing the same white undershirt for the past few days. His face is scruffy and unshaven, the most he has ever let it grow.

Martha pushes her red hair away from her face and puts one hand on her hip. "Really?" She slaps his feet off the desk and exits the room. "It's been over a month!" she then yells from the kitchen.

He hears the clinking of dishes being put into the sink not too carefully and the clicking of her dramatic heels. "It has not," he retorts. Now with both feet planted on the ground, he sets his laptop on the desk and gets up from his chair, rubbing a hand over his face. It's been four weeks and three days, but he won't admit that he has been counting. Or going to the club every chance he gets since he lost a week and a half in LA, letting Alexis visit Meredith.

"Face it darling." His mother reenters the room. She makes a flourish with her hand as though she's going to give him a bit of wisdom.

But he does not want to hear it. "Don't," he warns from the window, crossing his arms and tensing.

She raises both hands in the air. "All I am going to say is this...maybe it's not mean to be."

"Mother!" He turns from the window dropping his hands into fists at his sides and fixes her with a glare.

"Well, don't you think you would have found her by now? You went back to her apartment right? And you couldn't remember the apartment number."

"I was hungover," he deadpans, but also feels ashamed of himself.

She gestures to him and then to the ceiling. "See, the odds are against you," she says as if the universe is trying to tell him something.

Maybe they have been. First there was the week and a half lost in L.A, then there was a few days of book signings, Alexis came down with a cold. His deadline was up and he was forced to stay in every night. He only made it to the club maybe three nights sporadically and he never saw her...Yes, it's incredibly hard to admit, but perhaps his mother is right. He makes an exasperated sound wiping his hands over his face again.

"I'm sorry, kiddo," she says, and she really means it.

He lets his shoulders sag and turns towards the window again. The cool air brushes at his face, and he closes his eyes. He hears his mother leave shutting the door behind her. He sighs again, and lets himself think back to that night. The air was cooler then, as he and the mysterious woman hastened to her apartment. He remembers the clicking of her heels and the feel of her body pressed into his for balance. Or maybe it was the other way around. Either way, the result of that night, and the remaining days up to this moment have never affected him so greatly. He feels more depressed about it then his divorce with Meredith, and he only knew this woman for one night.

He doesn't know what to do now...

He can't continue like this because Paula has been breathing down his neck about public appearance. Apparently he hasn't been making enough of them, and his image is everything. His made up persona sells books. Well, if being himself got him nowhere, then maybe Paula is onto something...

* * *

><p>"Daddy!" Alexis bounds down the sidewalk, all red hair and smiling face as she slams into Rick.<p>

"Hey Pumpkin," he says into her neck as she squeezes him. "How was school?"

She lets go, and takes his hand as they walk down the street. "Connor pulled on my pigtails again today." She scowls while smoothing her hand down one perfect little pigtail.

"Did you tell the teacher?" he asks scowling along with his daughter and swinging her arm back and forth with his as they make their way to the diner.

Alexis looks up at him, jumping over a crack in the sidewalk. "I wanted too..." She trails of looking down as she hops over another one.

He watches her, feeling sympathetic and angry at the same time that she has to go through this already. At only the age of seven. And kids can be down right evil at this age, not to mention his little girl the the very opposite. "Why not?" he asks even though he knows the answer.

"I don't want to be a tattle tail, and hitting does _not _solve _anything_." She says that last part proudly, looking up at her father who stares back with a huge grin on his face.

"That's my girl," he replies as they stop outside Remy's Diner.

Alexis squeezes his hand and then lets go to use all her strength to pull open the door. Once inside she skips over to their table by the window, and scoots into the booth on the opposite side of Rick. Her little feet dangle off the seat as she pulls a menu over to herself. When she lifts it up, he can't see her anymore.

Rick stares at what little he can see of the top of her head, and lets his mind wander. Sometimes he wonders if he'll run into the woman on the street. Like at the news stand he frequents, or the grocery store, the mall, the park or here in the Diner. He refuses to believe that night was it. He wants to know her story. Why they met. Why now doesn't seem like the best time. Because obviously that is what this is. At least that is what he's going to hold onto. The fact that timing is everything and now might not be the right time.

"I think I am going to have...Chicken Nuggets," Alexis says and lets the menu flop down in front of her, causing loose strands of hair to flutter about. "What are _you_ going to have?"

Rick blinks a few times coming out of his pondering and puts on a smile for her. "I don't know," he replies with an exaggerated shrug.

"You are going to eat something this time right?" she asks looking at him more like a scolding parent then his little daughter.

He can't help but feel guilty, and so he grins poking her on the nose. "How about you choose for me."

Her face lights up and she disappears behind the menu once again. Rick laughs taking a sip of water the waitress has just put down.

"What can I get you two today?" the young brunette asks sweetly.

The menu comes down and Alexis looks to Rick briefly before her full attention is on the waitress. "I will have the chicken nuggets, with french fires and a chocolate shake, and he will have a cheeseburger with Onion rings."

"What no shake?" he pouts.

Alexis sighs. "And a chocolate shake," she relents, handing the waitress the menus who smiles and shakes her head at the cuteness before walking away.

"Thanks, pumpkin." he says pulling on one of her pigtails. "Does this mean your paying?" he then asks when she slaps his hand away.

"No. I am only seven," she replies.

From the way she was ordering she could have fooled him.

A few minutes later Rick steals a fry off her plate and grins at her as she protests. "You know," he says around the fry.

She looks at him with her straw in her mouth. "What?"

"Boys only pull girls pigtails because they like them."

* * *

><p>Rick pulls up to a club downtown. It's nine o clock, later that night and he had just put Alexis to bed twenty minutes ago. The only shred of evidence he has of his former self as he steps out of the black limo vanishes once he puts his shades on and plasters on his grand smile. He's immediately assaulted with camera flashes and the sound of the music beating inside. It pulses in his blood, bringing him back to that night.<p>

He resists the urge to clamp his fists and ignores the questions and paparazzi as he makes his way inside. Once in there he hands his jacket off to the coat-check without looking at him and then scans the area. The beat is thrumming through the many bodies in the place as red and yellow lights shine down on them, spinning and moving like the many dancers. And of course, he is looking for her. This is a different club but it doesn't mean he can't be hopeful. He half expects to see her lithe body slither through the throng like she did a month ago. Her body humming to the beat of his heart and the pulse in his hands as he reached for her. Only his hands are left tingling, and she does not materialize in this club only exclusive people are allowed.

"Ricky!" He hears over the loud music and turns his head just in time to see his agent Paula Haas, walking up to him with open arms.

Her hair black hair is pulled back as it often is, and she's all red lips and tall curvy body as she makes her way to him. A group of people flank her and he inwardly cringes as most of them look like woman starving for the limelight.

"Paula!" he says, trying not to grit his teeth.

"Glad you could make it!" she says, enveloping him in a tight hug. A show for the group of three woman, all dolled up and reeking of too much perfume. It all mingles in a cloud around him and he finds himself hardly able to breath.

"Of course. Where else would I be?" he asks non commodity. He still searches over her shoulder and his heart plummets. She's not going to be here.. this is it.

Paula squeezes him, bone crushing and he realizes it's a warning. "She's not here," she hisses into his ear. "So get it together and mingle with these people like the Richard Castle we know and love." She lets go at that last part and pinches his cheeks.

"Who else would I be?" he asks, dropping his head slightly and peering at the group with his sunglasses down his nose. He opens his arms as if to embrace this life, and the group laughs.

"He's something, isn't he?" Paula asks, and all three woman, all blonde, giggle nodding there heads enthusiastically as they look him up and down.

"Can I have your autograph?" one blonde asks, all teeth and boobs.

"Sure!" He tries for zealous and it seems to work. "Where would you like it?" He whips a pen from his shirt pocket. Something Paula has made sure he is always handy with.

The woman looks at him sheepishly and alluringly when she comes up with no paper, or no book, but instead, pulls the V of her barely there dress and pushes one breast up for him to sign. Paula looks at him devilishly. Like this is the most delicious detail he can make of himself, and subtly pushes him foreword.

As the other two crowd around him obviously wanting the same thing... Richard Castle takes one last look for what he knows he wont find, and shrugs his shoulders. He says nothing, waggling his eyebrow to produce a flock of laughter and pastes a satisfied look on his face. He bites his tongue between his teeth as he leans in to sign what will be one of many chests.

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><p><strong>Please review!<strong>


	8. Chapter Seven

_****_**Sorry guys!I have been really sick the past few weeks, and it's been very hard to focus on this chapter. But here it is finally! enjoy :D**

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><p><em><strong>Chapter Seven<strong>_

It's a fairly nice day out, a sharp contrast to the dark clouds looming over her entire body. She feels cold, like the air around her, with it's over cast skies and lack of snow this winter. Yet she moves as though she is walking through piles of it. So deep and so thick, she might just give in and lie in it's icy grasp. If it's like this now, she wonders what spring will be like. Maybe it will come in like a lion, as they say. But Kate feels as if the beast has already come and gone, taking a few lambs with it.

She feels like a failure. Her head hangs, watching her heeled feet click along the sidewalk. They are visible around her slight baby bump and that all too familiar lump forms in her throat. Part hormones and part deep rooted guilt. What has come of those two babies stolen from their dying mothers? Those mothers they will never know of. Instead, they will be raised by strangers willing to pay despite the cost of human lives.

Will those bastards keep at it, now that they seem to have stopped their sadistic crime spree? Kate thinks she was getting too close and they knew somehow that she was closing in, and so, they closed up shop, forcing this case to run cold. It's now stuffed into a box in storage. Kate just doesn't know if they have stopped for good or if this is just a lull in their extracurricular activities. As if they have gone into hiding...from her.

"Detective Beckett!"

Kate looks up, realizing she's made it to one of her destinations. "Hey, Forrest." She greets the newspaper vendor.

"Saw you on the news yesterday, I didn't want to believe it till I saw it on the front page this morning." The older man, in his fifties leans over his counter and points to the latest issue if _The New York Times._

Kate follows his grungy finger and picks up the paper next to a stack of gossip magazines. Sure enough there is her failure all over the front page and in bold print.

_**The Deliverers could not be Delivered**_

She shakes her head at the punchline, even though it gives her a swift punch to the gut and weakens her knees at such a blunt reminder.

"You looked good though." Forrest comments ever so kindly as usual.

"Thank you." She replies scanning the rest of the paper. She gasps. There in the far right column is Richard Castle.

Forrest leans farther over the counter. "Ah, yes. Seems like our dear Mr. Castle has mastered more than the Macabre." He says with a hint of distaste.

Kate frowns, a pang shooting through her chest. She reads on realizing what the old man means by that. The picture is of the man in question out at a club signing his autograph on a blonde's chest. There are other ditsy and pedantic looking women huddled around waiting eagerly.

"Playboy." Forrest says, shaking his head and making a tsk sound.

She only hums, brow creased severely as she flips the paper onto the counter to pay. Forrest shakes his head and waves her off. "Thank you." She replies absently as she clutches the paper to her chest.

"Anything for you, detective." He answers with a grin.

She gives him a smile and wanders off down the sidewalk. She will have to show Lanie once she gets to work. If the ME hasn't seen it already.

* * *

><p>There's an aroma all around him, and it pricks at the edge of his mind. It's some sort of flower...or fruit, he thinks. The more he slips into consciousness the more its scent invades his senses. A smile creeps onto his face for a moment when be becomes aware of the warmth beside him. He breathes in and then chokes.<p>

Not cherries.

Everything starts to register now. This is not his bed or his fluffy pillow, and that smell...his eyes snap open and his body jolts upright. He claps his head on a wave of dizziness and looks over to his left. He sees not the mysterious brunette or even Meredith, but a blonde from...where?

She shifts, a small sigh escaping her large lips. The sheet slips from her shoulder to expose one breast.

Right. He signed her chest...

Rick suppresses a groan and slips from her sheets, stark naked and hastens to put his clothes on. Without even glancing at the bed and it's occupant, he snatches up his sunglasses from the floor and leaves her apartment. With a sigh and a hand on his forehead, he squints at the number on her door. He growls at himself before taking the elevator.

He's truly on a walk of shame as he exits the building and heads off down the street towards his loft. He's not as excited about this spring sort of day, with it's bright sun beating down on him and his growing hangover. Instead, he feels more like dark clouds are looming over him. He could certainly write that better, but for now he walks with his head down and sunglasses propped too close to his eyes. He wishes no one could see him. This walk of shame makes him feel like every single person walking on the street are staring at him and pointing. Like they already know what sort of person he just made of himself last night. Now there is nothing he can do about it. The damage has been done and the only thing he can do is embrace it...and then sulk about it in private.

"Ah, Mr. Castle." Castle looks up, his sunglasses slipping from his nose, and he has to blink a few times before the newspaper vendor comes into view.

Forrest stares at him with a disapproving look. As if he witnessed the downfall of Richard Alexander Rogers in one fell swoop of a pen to bosom. With every round of flesh he signed, the man slipped away, and was replaced with Richard Edgar Castle, the celebrity who if you say his made up surname, asshole comes to mind. Yes...that's him. Rick the asshole, playboy extraordinaire, and just over night.

With a slow squint of his eyes, he fixes the sunglasses onto his nose, ignores the old man, and reaches for a copy of _The New York Times_. His heart sinks at the headline. He's been following the case with a melancholic curiosity and to see those cynics go free...And the terrifying thing is, they will probably pick up where they left off. Its just a matter of when and who will be chosen for this sick trade. Where are those babies now? Wherever they are, Rick hopes they both will be taken care of as well as their own mothers would have.

Rick shakes his head gravely and lets his eyes scan the rest of the articles. When he sees himself, he grips the edge, nearly ripping the newspaper. Now that he has time to think about it, he is less impressed with himself now than he was last night. He _definitely _looks like an asshole. What was he thinking? Obviously, he wasn't. Paula was thinking for him, and now he can't get out of it. Rick sighs heavily slapping an unknowable amount of money in front of a smug Forrest. Rick turns away and continues on his walk of shame hoping that Alexis won't grow up to resent him for this.

* * *

><p>Kate sits with her back to the empty murder board. She's waiting for Lanie, who is coming up to the bullpen, so they can both avoid another run in with a dead body, and a sink full of vomit.<p>

"Hey girl," Lanie appears placing a strawberry shake in front of the detective before pulling up a chair for herself.

"Thank you," Kate snatches it up and takes a sip immediately. Her eyes close and she hums into the straw in bliss. The ME sips her own shake, leaning back and crossing her legs, one over the other.

"So you saw it?" Kate asks leaning back as she comes back from her short moment of pleasure. She still has her straw in her mouth unable to part with it. Kudos to Lanie for finding Kate's other one true love aside from coffee. Which of course she is not allowed to have the pleasure of enjoying for another eight months or so.

Lanie nods her head pursing her lips, "Mmmm, hmmm."

Kate looks off across the bullpen, watches with teary eyes as Ryan and Esposito get off the elevator and she nods to the boys as if nothing is wrong. They look at Lanie curiously but nod back before sitting back at their own desks.

Lanie shrugs, setting her shake down, "I don't know sweetie, that could just be a publicity thing."

Kate scoffs.

"What, you aren't going to tell him because of that picture?" The saucy ME tilts her head and stares Kate down through her eyelashes, one eyebrow crooked disapprovingly.

Kate sucks on the straw, and smacks her lips, "And his ex-wife." She adds as if it's good enough reason.

"Whose to say it wasn't her doing?" Lanie replies leaning forward.

"Evidence." Kate pulls the newspaper from next to her desk and points aggressively at Richard Castle.

"Looks can be deceiving baby. You're not going to tell him because of how it _looks_?" She nods her head at the paper, sliding her shake from the desk and sitting back once more.

"Tell who, what?"

"How what looks?"

Ryan and Esposito walk up then, the curious detectives they are.

"You haven't told them?" Lanie leans close to Kate and asks through her teeth.

"No." Kate bites down on her straw, and her hand unconsciously goes to her stomach that she has successfully been able to hide so far.

"Tell us what?" Esposito asks, crossing his arms and looking between the two woman.

"What's going on?" Ryan sits on the edge of Kate's desk.

Kate sighs, getting up from her chair. "Come with me." She doesn't bother looking back as Lanie follows her to the Captain's office.

"Beckett?" Montgomery asks right when he is hanging up the phone.

His hand stays on the phone now in the cradle as he looks behind her. The boys crowd in and shut the door behind them. He shares their puzzled looks, "Something wrong?"

"Nothing sir, I just need to tell you all…" She looks down at her shake still clutched in both hands. Lanie places a hand on Kate's shoulder reassuringly. "I'm pregnant."

Ryan gasps. The Captain sighs, leaning back in his chair and gives Kate a small, fatherly smile. Esposito steps closer a look of pure concern on his face, and a question or two in his eyes.

"We've got your back, sweetie." Lanie says, squeezing Kate's shoulder before glaring at the boys to say something.

"Of course, Beckett. " Ryan adds, his soft blue eyes melting her heart. He's such a sweet man.

"Who is the guy?" Esposito crosses his arms

"I know who it is Javi and that's enough." Kate replies, turning towards him and placing a hand on one of his arms.

"If he needs his ass kicked..." His brow creases over soft brotherly eyes.

"I'll do it myself. But...thanks." she gives his arm a squeeze and smiles.

"I...we are here for you Kate." He drops his arms and gives her a nod. Ryan bumps his partners shoulder.

"Thanks Espo." Kate feels a lump form in her throat and looks back down at her shake. Lanie turns towards the boys to show she approves of their reactions.

"This is wonderful news, Detective." Montgomery stands up from his desk, walking around it to stand in front of her. He looks down at Kate, as if he wants to hug her. But it's never been their thing, so he extends a hand

"Thank you, Sir." She takes his hand in hers, and feels him tighten his hold tenderly.

He smiles and drops her hand. "Regulations say that you will be on desk duty soon, but for now, just be extra careful when you go out on calls." He tilts his head down to give her a stern look, knowing all to well that she's never inclined to listen.

"Yes Sir." She nods, emphasizing so he knows that she will in fact...try.

"I'll get with the union and the chief, but I don't foresee any problems either." Montgomery walks around his desk and bends to take a seat. "Congratulations Detective. Now, back to work, all of you!" He sits back down and raises an eyebrow at the lot before they all bustle out.

Kate takes a seat at her desk, a smile playing on her lips. The boys pat her on the back, and take their seats as well. From there, the day turns out like any other, only the weight of holding back has softened. The knowledge that even if she chooses to inform Richard Castle or not, she still has the support of her team.

* * *

><p>He doesn't feel like he deserves the hug around the neck as Alexis wraps her arms tightly around him. He certainly deserves the look his mother is giving him as she stands by the stairs. Her arms are crossed with a newspaper under her arm, her silky turquoise robe shimmers in the morning light, causing his headache to split his head in two.<p>

He ignores her as best he can, burying his face in his little girls hair and breathes her in. The feel of her in his arms brings him instantly out of it. Standing up, he takes her with him, and makes his way past his mother, and plops his tiny minion onto the counter.

"What's for breakfast?" He asks her, while searching for some asprin.

"I'd say an omelet of shame with a side of regret...but pancakes work too." Martha walks over, hitting him on the back with the newspaper.

"Would you like a Bloody Mary with that mother or are you good with your cup of rapier wit?"

"No, no Richard, the pancakes will be fine. And this cup of rapier wit tastes very good."

"Not like a money peed and battery acid?" He snaps his fingers in an 'oh darn' sort of way and gives her a cheeky grin.

"Funny boy. Only age brings this type of sweet in the morning, darling."

"Is that what that smell is?" He waves a a hand over his nose and tosses Alexis an exaggerated expression, who giggles, kicking her feet on the counter.

"No that is the smell of being right, darling. Not surprised you fail to recognize it."

"Can I just I have chocolate chips in mine?" Alexis asks, completely oblivious to whats conspiring between her father and Grandmother. "All that other stuff sounds...complicated... and mean." She crosses her arms, pouty lips and all.

"Not mean darling, just..."

"Motherly. Sometimes, grown-ups joke with each other."

Rick throws his mother a look and walks over to Alexis. A smile slips onto his face at how utterly adorable she is and how easy it is to just fall into it. "Of course you can, pumpkin!" He says pinching her cheeks, dodging her hand which tries to swat at him.

"Oh." Alexis says with a bob of her head, her lips in a perfect 'O' shape.

Rick walks back to her, as his mother takes a seat at the island. He squirts some whipped cream into his mouth, watching his daughter all the while, and then grinning, mouth full when she licks her own lips eyes wide.

"Baby bird?" He asks.

She only stares, tilting her head to one side and considering it for a moment. "Yeah," she says in a whisper, nodding her head vigorously before tipping her head back. "Just this once." She says with a mouthful, dribbling some onto her chin and causing a fit of laughter from her small family.

* * *

><p><strong>Thoughts? And special thanks to Jerryst316 for betaing this chapter for me :D<strong>


	9. Chapter Eight

**A/N: Sorry my dear readers. I have been slowly getting better and **_**then**_ **I was too busy flailing around and dieing from the** "_**47 seconds" **_ **promo to do anything else. PLUS! I have a collaboration going again with my lovely partner, kimmiesjoy, which she is posting. It's called **_**Out of the Woods.**_ **Please check it out :D**

**I know you all have been waiting patiently, so on with the story, enjoy 3**

* * *

><p><em><strong>Chapter Eight<strong>_

He stands outside his apartment building. The rush of traffic before him and the padding of many, many feet beside him on the sidewalk in either direction. It's loud today, he thinks, pulling his shoulders back and bringing his coffee to his lips. The honking of horns and the whizzing of cars, taxi drivers yelling at each other and pedestrians, fills him with more anxiousness then he initially started out with.

And yet, Rick loves this city. The way it bristles with life infuses him with a sense of wonder and hope, and he can't think of a better place to raise his little girl. When New York City speaks, it's in a language this writer can appreciate. The people, the atmosphere, and even Frank Sinatra, reveal the truth to him through metaphor and subtext. That this is the greatest city in the world.

But he would gladly trade all that in, even the simple things like the ruckus, the summer heat, the wind on his face, on top of the constant bumping and crowding of the New Yorkers for the peels of laughter, hugs around the neck, and smiles from his daughter. He would love to just spend every waking moment with her, to watch the spark in her blue eyes, the swish of her fiery red hair. Her youth and passion and almost naive view of the world fills him with hope, and when she is with him, this life, full of tragedy and disappointments, lightens and shines more brightly. She is his lighthouse, that inner beacon that constantly points out the optimism, that leads him to his purpose.

But it's worth it. The things he must do on a regular basis. Sometimes the wait leaves him anxious. Body tense because he just doesn't want to do, or be anywhere else. It's a gift, really. When he gets home, or when he picks her up from a night at a friends house. As though it's been way too long. He always feels like there was too much time wasted.

Speaking of which.

Rick blinks a few times, coming out of his thoughts to take a look at his watch. He nearly pours his coffee down his front, the tan liquid dripping to the scalding asphalt beneath his sensible shoes. It's then he realizes that it's just past twelve. If he wants to make it in time, he better get going or he's going to be late.

* * *

><p>She can hear the chatter around her, the undertone of the espresso machines, the fizz of milk heating for a cappuccino. The scrape as it's poured onto the waiting steamy tan liquid. She can smell its enticing aroma, it's so alluring that her whole body responds at just the familiarity. She can even feel the warmth of it, the hot coffee as it sears her throat pleasantly and the foam that attaches itself to her top lip. She purses those lips, eyes rolling upwards as she lifts her cup to her mouth. Her hands quiver, cupping the mug in anticipation, and a hum of anxiousness leaves her mouth as she takes a sip.<p>

Only, it's not a cappuccino...it certainly burns its way down her throat, but the hot chocolate that flows through her at least _half _satisfies her. Kate frowns slightly, looking over at the counter longingly as the Batista pushes a tall cup, steam rising into a waiting hand, before it's whisked away. She groans, eyes now out the window and watches as the lucky owner of that cup of coffee walks by and out of sight.

Another sound escapes her, a long, pitiful sigh, and she props her elbow onto the table exasperatedly before plopping her left cheek into her palm. She hasn't the slightest idea how she's lasted this long. She's gotten this far, a bit longer, and she can taste the strong brown liquid she craves. Only...this is not a craving she can quench. But there are others. Like this hot chocolate, with a bit of whipped cream on the top.

Of course. Why complain? The prize will be so much sweeter. The caffeine withdrawal and headaches will be worth it in the end. Kate is sure she is more impatient for it than coffee. The time is approaching. Slowly... so slowly she feels.

Speaking of which.

Kate snaps out of her thoughts, letting her slack grip on her coffee fall, fingers splayed on the table before she drags it to her. She flicks her wrist, the sleeve falling down to her elbow, and then checks her watch. Nearly twelve thirty. He's late.

* * *

><p>Rick quickly hails a cab, tossing his hand hurriedly into the air before one screeches to a halt by his side. He gets in quickly, telling the young cabbie the address before falling back against the seat with a huff. He taps his fingers on his knee impatiently, holding his now cold cup of coffee in his other hand. He needs more. If he's going to get through this day he's going to need so much more.<p>

Traffic jam. God damnit.

He sits forward in his seat, looking through the windshield over the cabbies shoulder. Everyone is backed up. If he's going to make it, he's going to have to get out, and run. Throwing money at the young man, Rick flings the door open and runs down the sidewalk. After a few blocks he stops, bending forward and panting. Summer is in full force today and it's beating down on him.

Once he catches his breath, he stands straight again and looks up over a large window to realize he is in front of the coffee shop. Checking his watch, he sees it's almost twelve thirty. No time for coffee. With another deep breath, he continues on down the sidewalk to the park to pick up Alexis from her play-date.

* * *

><p>The door jingles behind her, and she turns as best as she can, her wrist falling back to the table with a loud thump when she sees it's not him. Her cheek meets her palm again, and her eyes land on the sidewalk outside. It's empty a lull in the day, something she was looking for before she headed back to work.<p>

"Katie!"

Kate looks over to see her dad standing at her table. "There you are! What took you so long?" She goes to slide out of the booth to then be met by her dads hand held up in protest.

He pats her arm instead, "Don't bother we would never get you back in there." He jokes sitting in the seat in front of her and nodding at the waitress for a coffee. "Traffic, all backed up on Avenue of the Americas, but I am here now."

"Hey!" She fakes hurt and then smiles, squeezing his hand. "Yes you are." She replies, a warmth rising in her.

He tilts his head to one side, regarding her for a moment. After she feels that he seems satisfied, he nods his head. "You look good." He comments. "Feeling good? How's my little granddaughter?" He sounds so happy, his face lit up and a smile on his face she hasn't seen in years.

Kate places a hand over her stomach, smoothing over the now large curve. Her hand moves down under the bulge, and then back up again to rest lovingly near her belly button. "We are both really good dad, how are you?"

He nods again, squeezing her hand before leaning back. She gets a warning pang in her chest when a look comes across his face. She holds her breath.

"I am very good, Katie.. now."

She sighs rolling her eyes upwards. "Dad."

"Hey now, don't be like that, a father worries. I just want to know if you have decided to tell this.. Richard Castle, that he is expecting another child."

Kate looks down at her belly, fingers splayed, and removes her other hand from her hot chocolate. With both hands on her belly, she feels a kick, swift, and strong. She lets a small smile loose at the same time as her heart beat quickens with joy.

"See that right there." Her dad says, pointing at her obvious happiness. "Don't you want to share that with him?"

A tear threatens to escape. She would. She hasn't forgotten their connection. She will never forget the life that man seemed to breathe into her that one night, and this life that now grows inside her womb. Kate looks up, eyes moist, and only nods.

He enters the park from the west side, his run from the cabbie to here has brought him to the wrong entrance, so he has to stop for a moment to catch his breath before he continues. He's only a few minutes late, so he allows himself to walk. It's slightly cooler here, shadowed by the trees and the light breeze that sweeps in around him.

Everyone is out today for lunch. Lounging on the grass, or sitting on benches or picnic tables in small groups. Some even sit alone, reveling in the beautiful day in solitude. Perhaps they seek the quiet, maybe their jobs are hectic and sometimes they just need to get as far away from it as possible. No matter the reason, this place, or any park for that matter, is the perfect location. And as Rick makes his way towards the playground on the far side, he decides he should sit under a tree later in the week and write for a while.

A jogger runs by, music blasting from her earphones, and a few bicyclists whoosh past him as well. But as he gets closer to his destination, he only has eyes from the tiny redhead running around on the elevated wood-chips. A smile breaks out on his handsome face, so wide his eyes wrinkle at the corners. He steps up next to the mother of the little girl Alexis spent the night with, and greets her casually.

Just as Alexis slides down a slide, spotting him on her way down, sirens start approaching. Quiet at first over the hum of the city, and then louder before Rick turns to see a few police cruisers pull into the front entrance. Two men get out of their car, a tough looking latino, and a smaller man. Both are dressed in plain clothes. Detectives.

Rick's curiosity gets the better of him, his heart quickening and his fingers tingling for a story. But at the same time, he is also alarmed. What could have happened to lure a pair of detectives and uniforms to the park on such a beautiful day? He shudders at the thought just as a small body collides with his legs.

"Daddy!" Alexis shrieks, lifting her arms to him and looking at the flashing lights.

"It's okay pumpkin." He soothes, lifting her up and hugging her to his side. He thanks the mother, who's also gathering up her daughter, and heads in the opposite direction of whatever has taken place today.

* * *

><p>Kate lets out a laugh, sitting back against the booth and covering her mouth with her hand. Her father chuckles as well sipping his coffee, which Kate eyes every now and then. "You're boys are something else." Her dad is saying, as she catches her breath from telling a break room incident from the other day.<p>

"They really are." Kate agrees on a sigh, a smile still evident on her face.

"I am happy to know that you have those two, and your ME to watch over you when I can't be here." He says, growing slightly more serious again. "Keep you at your desk." He raises an eyebrow at that.

"Ugh, desk duty is so boring dad, I am going crazy." She says, pushing a hand through her hair, her other still on her stomach.

"I know Katie, but it's dangerous out there. You need to look out for yourself and my granddaughter, who, by the way, do we have a name for?"

Kate bites her lip, she hasn't really thought about it. "I..I thought maybe I would name her af-" Her phone starts to ring. "Hold on, sorry." He gives him an apologetic look before digging in her purse for her phone. "Beckett." She answers all detective now, instead of the smiling seven months pregnant woman.

"Kate." It's Esposito. The sound of her first name coming out of his mouth frightens her.

"What is it?" She asks, turning her face away from her father who looks on with concern.

There is a small pause, a blip of a siren. "We have a body."

"Espo, I am on desk duty, couldn't you have told me that when you got back?" She asks, still on alert.

"It's at the park, Becks."

Kate's mouth drops open.

"A pregnant woman was found in Battery Park half an hour ago."

A hand flies to her mouth to stifle a gasp at the same time as her eyes dart down to her stomach.

* * *

><p><strong>Thoughts?<strong>


	10. Chapter Nine

_**Chapter Nine**_

It's sounds like a live Charlie Brown cartoon in here. The annoying noise that teacher makes washes over him and comes out of two mouths he would rather not invest his hearing in. So, he desperately tries to tune them out, with his feet up on the table in the conference room, eyes searching the large glass windows that look over a part of New York City. Black Pawn Publishing is all a flutter with his new Derrick Storm novel, which is to hit the shelves tomorrow. And then he is off on a plane to sign books in a few states for god knows how long...

There is a change in pitch, one more excitable than the other and it jolts his nerves for a moment as he briefly looks over at Paula and Gina who are discussing a last minute booking in Boston. Rick had stopped listening around the time Paula mentioned some clubs in several states Richard Castle should make an appearance. Places in which, he's never heard of even in all his travels, and frankly doesn't want to be carted around half the country to sign countless copies for crazed fans who probably don't even like the books so much as obsess over him and his persona.

It's not even real. This person he's been made out to be. And it's times like these that, although he ends up having a blast, he still wishes there was someone else in his life who saw the real him. Other than his mother, who is often a pain in his ass, at least respects both sides of him, whether she approves of his gallivanting or not. She still loves him.

And Alexis... well she's still not old enough to understand, and he wants to keep that innocence in her life.. He hopes she never has to witness the fake realities of the world, even though he sugar coats everything he can for as long as possible. He just wants her to grow up being true to herself, even though he is a walking contradiction.

"We could also go up to Maine and maybe hit Florida after that." Paula's voice finally registers.

Rick's feet slide off the table with a loud thud.

"Ready to join us now, Ricky?" Paula asks snapping her gum with a wise ass look on her face. Gina sighs, head turning with her elbow up on the table and her face in her hands. She's clearly exasperated.

"Yeah, and can we stick to one area please? I don't want to fly Alexis all over the damn country." Rick replies leaning forward and pointing at a small map Paula has out on the table.

"I thought your mother was watching the kid?" The dark haired woman asks, hand on one hip that juts out to one side, challenge in her eyes.

Gina rolls hers.

"Yes, but with these..._Deliverers _on the loose, she might not be safe." He says in all honesty, concern etched in the corner of his eyes.

"Rick." Gina stands from the table, gathering up the map. "These sickos are after _pregnant _women. _Not _seven and a half year olds." She pushes her blonde hair over her shoulder and turns towards the door, more than ready to get the hell out of here.

"Who's to say they don't change it up, turn to trafficking kids?"

Paula laughs. "Save it for your books."

* * *

><p>An empty box sits on her desk in front of a full murder board. The thought to be cold case now open again with same old dried up leads waiting for new evidence to make them more feasible. Her talk with her father earlier in the day has pretty much been forgotten as Kate stares up at the board from her chair, hand protectively on her stomach. Richard Castle and informing him of this baby inside her, is the last thing on her mind, although he keeps popping up every now and then the longer she stares at the faces of these victims.<p>

Her mind drifts to how alone they must have felt. And how at least she has the boys, her captain, father and Lanie. But maybe... just maybe Richard Castle could be a part of this little family too...if she had the guts to tell him. Never in her wildest dreams had she ever thought she'd even speak to the man, let alone carry his child. A child which is being rather rambunctious

The baby has been more active the last few hours. She must be feeling Kate's uneasiness and hasn't let up her vicious kicking all afternoon, and now it's well into the evening.

Kate shakes her head, removing the image of her favorite author from her mind and letting her eyes scan the scattered amount of dry erase marker on the whiteboard. Her head is aching a little, and her body spinning from the amount of hours she's spent here. Kate has ignored every bit of help and coaxing from the boys to be brought home, only letting them feed her as they ran off to search for evidence while she's been otherwise stuck here. Her stack of paperwork has also been forgotten, now with a case to work on that needs more of her attention than anything else.

Along with her aching head, her back hurts today, from her exuberant baby and being stuck to this chair. Not to mention the embarrassing need to be helped out of it, to walk around or use the bathroom five times in half an hour by the boys, or Lanie.

Lanie ventured up here with her findings two hours ago, since Kate going to the morgue was out of the question. And other than her nagging to get the hell up and go find Richard Castle, the bothersome ME had not much else to say.

So far she has confirmed that the victim has the same MO as the previous ones... only, as Kate looks away from the victim, this woman's baby was removed from her by brutal force. A sticky note lays over the gruesome image of a woman bled to death in the park, abdomen cut open strategically, baby removed, and mother left to die..

Another homeless woman, victimized by her rank. Taken from the world because they were thought not to matter or be missed. Even though Kate never knew these poor women, she misses them. Just like she feels the loss of every victim for which she finds justice. And although no one is looking for them...Kate will find the solace these lost souls deserve.

But again, the only people connected to these victims, Father Julian, Dr. Peirce McHale, and his nurse have all checked out.

"Hey." Kate looks over to see Ryan round a corner, a folder in his hand and a look of less apprehension from when they started on his kind face.

"_Please _tell me you've got something." She asks, wiping a hand tiredly over her face and rubbing her belly, cringing at a sharp kick.

Ryan's eyebrows rise in concern, his soft blues watching as her face returns to normal and she lets out a breath. "We just might!" There is a small pause as Kate moves uneasily in her chair. "You doing okay, want me to take you home?"

"Umm." She adjusts again. "Tell me what you've found first."

He looks at her sternly, head inclined and giving her the eyes.

"Promise."

His eyes drop to the folder as he opens it. "Okay, well CSU found a pair of tire treads near the location of the body... on further analysis they were able to find out the make and model of the car they belong to."

Kate's eyes grow wide in excitement as she tries to get out of her chair. "What is it?" She braces a hand on the desk, and starts to rise.

Ryan rushes over to help her get up, dropping the evidence on her desk, "A 1990 Dodge Grand Caravan." He hoists her out of the chair, one arm under her armpit with hers slung over his shoulder. "Too late to run down anything further, so lets get you home."

* * *

><p>A 1990 Dodge Grand Caravan pulls up to a curb. A lone figure gets out, the door screeching in protest, echoing amongst the trees of the quiet park. The figure looks around before walking to a nearby picnic table, eyes scanning the area.<p>

"Warm night." Another figure says, stepping around a large oak tree.

"It is." The other agrees with a nod of their head, looking up into the sky, scarce of stars and moon, the city lights corrupting the brilliant glow of the universe.

"It's taken care of." The second says, their large footsteps heard over the New York traffic close by. New Yorkers who never sleep.

The first looks over, the seconds face pale in the lamplight. "Get a good price?" The first asks stepping up onto the bench of the picnic table and sitting on the top.

The second joins them, a tall frame looming over the other as they pull out an envelope and hand it to their partner before sitting down by their feet. "Quite the rich family, paid more then the little thing was worth in my opinion, but who am I to complain?" The tall one says with a wheezy laugh.

The first opens the envelope, their small fingers sifting through the money, mouth moving silently as they count. "Oh I don't know. I thought he was rather cute." They say sweetly, voice softening and their eyes wrinkling as if they were talking to the tiny baby boy they just sold and not a bundle of cash.

"If you say so." The second shrugs, looking off into the night. "This the next drop off?" They ask after a few moments.

The figure stands. "Yes." They say, putting the envelope of money into their pocket, "right off amongst that group of trees maybe." They point, "and you'll have to do it on your own again, I can't raise suspicion, what with the cops stopping in again after the last one."

The second groans. "I can't keep doing this by myself." They complain.

"Get over it." The first replies scolding before walking back to the van. "Bring me home, and then keep the van for a while, I'll take a cab to work tomorrow." They say throwing their partner the keys and walking around to the passengers side.

A jingling whizzes through the air before they are muffled by the seconds large hand catching them. They pull open the driver's side door, "have your eye on anyone new?" They ask sliding in and slamming the door.

"Yes." The first replies looking out the window. "I believe I do."


	11. Chapter Ten

_**Chapter Ten**_

They could see her walking, shoes padding down the sidewalk, feet absent of her usual power heels. But given her condition, it's only understandable. They watch, over the top of the thin newspaper as she stops suddenly, body turning away, her very large stomach now out of view of the peeping tom.

They follow her line of sight, and their heart seizes in their chest when they see what has caught her attention. The maroon van parked across the street, its wood panelling reflecting the sun from the sign for limited parking.

The paper comes down, eyes narrowing, waiting. They start to sweat and wipe an arm across their forehead to rid themselves of the tiny bead of nervousness that perspires there. They never thought of the van. And they should have known better when their partner didn't even want it. Should have dumped it yesterday...

Her phone comes out of her pocket, quick, and they swear under their breath when they hear her talking to one of her fellow detectives as she looks all around her. Her voice is excitable, and yet quivers as if from fear. As if the kidnappers themselves are standing close by, watching her every move, planning their next attack.

* * *

><p>She bites down on her lip. "Hey boss." Esposito answers, making her nerves feel less heywire.<p>

Kate pivots her body, looking around for who might own the van. "Esposito, can you run a plate for me?"

"Of course. Any reason?"

"Just..." She spots a few people by the newsstand, standing around reading the articles, and a group outside a diner chatting at the small tables. "A feeling..." She says, letting her hand fall to the side of her belly.

"Sure that isn't your kid?" She can hear him grinning.

"Esposito..." She snaps.

"Right...okay hit me."

She swings her head back around and concentrates on the license plate. "ADL-4325. Have the info for me when I get back..."

"You got it boss."

Her quivering skin prickles when she hangs up the phone, carefully putting it into her pocket once more, and continuing down the sidewalk. The baby gives a swift kick, and Kate lets her hand brush at her service piece as she passes the newsstand and the group of what appear to be tourists eating dinner together. Right dinner...that was her goal. Kate needed some air, and to stretch out a little, so she told Lanie she would get them dinner. Lanie is to meet her up in the bullpen in twenty minutes.

Another kick from the baby as Kate enters the diner sends a small gasp from Kate's lips. She stops at the counter, leaning heavily on it for a moment before ordering her and Lanie's dinner.

"Would you like to sit down miss?" A young man asks from behind the counter. His kind face and soft blue eyes calm her nerves.

She shakes her head, pressing on her belly to stop her little girl from assaulting her insides. "I'll never be able to get back up, but thank you." She gives him a smile and he disappears into the kitchen to prepare her food.

His eyes were so blue, she thinks to herself. A lot like another person she knows, and Kate wonders if her baby girl will also have those piercing blue eyes. The ones that smile. And as she stands, uncomfortably in the diner, Kate also wonders what kind of man Richard Castle probably is, and not the one that is mostly a persona he puts on for publicity purposes.

She feels she was too proud before, to admit that she needs him. Kate Beckett would never admit that she needs a man, but she's never felt such a...connection with anyone before. Let alone someone she's never truly gotten to know. She realizes that those sort of things are rare, and maybe she should go grab it before there are no other chances.

"Here you go." The young man is back, handing her a brown paper bag, inside a plastic bag. "Enjoy your evening." He says so kindly she wants to just hug him.

Hormones.

"Thank you." She gives him a large smile pushing off from the counter and waddling out onto the New York streets.

* * *

><p>Rick looks out the window into the night, the moon lighting their way. Alexis lays asleep at his side, her little head on his shoulder, arms wrapped around one of his. They only just took off, heading to...well he's already forgotten. All he cares about is his little girl safe at his side, high above the city they are leaving behind for a week or two.<p>

He yawns, looking down at the small redhead, the curves of her face, the softness of skin of her eyelids as her eyes move underneath them. It was a long day for the two of them. They had a book signing before being whisked away to the airport. And even though he was supposed to have forgotten about her, Rick still looked for the mystery woman he met seven months ago, amongst his crazed fans.

Hoping, just hoping he could quit this charade for even just a second, to look upon her beautiful face, and those stunning green eyes once more. Despite the scolding he got then, and the reminding every time she doesn't come into view, Rick will never forget her. He can't forget about the connection they shared, and only wishes to feel that sort of cosmic relief again someday.

* * *

><p>"There was a book signing down the block you know." Lanie is saying through a mouthful of salad.<p>

Kate's fidgeting in her chair and startles when Lanie gives her a swift poke with her fork. "Huh...sorry." She tosses her friend an apologetic look, all the while peering over the M.E's shoulder for any sign of the boys.

"Richard Castle, his new book came out today. Why didn't you get a book signed? And while you were down there, you could have casually brought up that you're carrying his baby." Lanie smiles crookedly and stares at Kate slyly through her eyelashes.

Kate glares at her, "shut up, Lanie." She snaps settling back into her chair forcefully, nearly toppling over her late dinner that sits on her belly.

"Just sayin..." Lanie trails off, eyes dropping to her salad as she pushes a cherry tomato around the container.

Kate sighs, "Sorry...it's just...I am so close." She stares at her dinner, watches the side of her container move slowly upwards, and then rest as the baby shifts.

"I know sweetie...you'll catch those sick bastards." Lanie replies her eyes widening when she witness the shift of the baby. "Wow, does she always move like that?"

"No." Kate shakes her head, a small, yet worried smile on her face. "I think...I feel..."

Lanie leans forward. "She's already in tune with you, Kate. Just...Breathe, and stay calm, okay? For her...for me, and the boys." She rests a hand on Kate's arm.

Kate looks up, head tilted to one side, tears in her eyes. "Thank you." She mouths, not being able to push past the lump in her throat.

"Anything for you sweetie, and hey I got you something." Lanie puts her dinner down on the desk and leans over her chair to retrieve something from her bag. "I knew you wouldn't go, so I bought you one."

Kate looks down as Lanie replaces her dinner, with the new Derrick Storm Novel. "Lanie..." Kate looks up, moisture even more evident in her green eyes. "I _am_going to tell him." She says, running her finger over the book jacket.

"You are?" Lanie sounds skeptical. "When?"

"Umm..." Kate purses her lips.

There is a small pause before Lanie's eyebrows shoot up and she gets that look on her face that usually means trouble. "Now. Girl. Go now. Up you go!" Lanie stands tugging Kate up by her hands. "Go right now or you'll never tell him, I know you." She steadies Kate on her feet, pulling her jacket from behind the chair and helping Kate into it before thrusting the book at her.

"Lanie I-"

"Now!" Lanie points sternly to the elevator. "I'll call you a cab, I'd take you myself but I have a fresh body on my slab...I'll be here all night..." She frowns, and then lightly pushes Kate towards the exit.

"Fine!" Kate says shrugging off the M.E. "Pushing a pregnant woman around." She mutters, hugging the book to her and standing at the elevator waiting for it to open.

* * *

><p>"I may have something, bro." Esposito gets into the car after telling Ryan to meet him here. He shuts the door against the heat of the night, and opens a folder in his lap.<p>

Ryan looks over turning the key in the ignition."What did you find?"

"Beckett gave me a plate to run on a stolen van she saw."

"The Deliverers?" Ryan asks, eyebrow raised and a higher pitch up excitement in his voice as he pulls away from the precinct

"Maybe." Esposito nods. "The owner filed a stolen vehicle report three days ago when his 1990 Dodge Caravan was stolen outside of Pietro's on 53rd."

"That's gotta be our van." Ryan sounds so hopeful.

"Yep. Let's go talk to our vic," Him and Ryan share a look before all eyes are on the road again. "and we can bring what we have to Beckett when we are done."

* * *

><p>Kate steps out into the summer night air just as a car pulls away from the curb to then be replaced by her cab. She stands at it, hand on the handle for a moment before she finally gets in. <em>This is it<em>. She thinks, struggling to rest against the back cabbie eyes her warily as he pulls into traffic. As if she's going to go into labor in his backseat. Kate crosses her arms over her belly, feeling another kick, a sharp pain in her lower back for a moment before she looks out the window. Nothing she's not used to, the baby just stretching out.

As she stares past her own reflection in the window, she wonders what her life could be like when she tells her baby's father. Would they end up together? She wonders, watching the city lights past by her window. She's always wanted to know what kind of man he really is, and she knows he already has a daughter. Perhaps he is a good father...and even if they don't end up together...which could still be a possibility, at least she wouldn't have to worry about finding her baby girl a father...but what is she going to say to him? Kate doesn't know how to tell him or how he will react or if he will even believe her.

But it's now or never right?

"Lady."

Kate snaps out of it, looking up to see the cabbie turned around in his seat. She opens the door, giving him some cash, and then ever so slowly easing out of the seat. The car is driving off even before the door shuts, and she is left alone to stare up at _The _Richard Castle's apartment building.

Kate cranes her neck, playing with the jacket of the book clutched in her hands. Her brow creases when her finger brushes along a tiny foreign edge. She looks down, seeing a piece of paper tucked between the pages. Opening it she finds a small scrap with an apartment number on it, written in Lanie's neat scrawl.

She shakes her head with a small laugh, closing the book and hugging it to her for a moment. With a deep breath, Kate stares at the door, gathering herself. This is it. Placing the book under her arm, and one hand on her belly she takes a step forward.

Now or never.

Just as she reaches her hand out, a strong arm wraps around her shoulders, pulling her forcefully from the entrance. She lets out a gasp, struggling, the book falling to the ground before a sharp pain shoots through her abdomen, followed by a pin prick to her neck. It's not long before Richard Castle's building blurs in her vision and everything goes black.


	12. Chapter Eleven

_**Chapter Eleven**_

Kate's eyes open, blinking and adjusting to the room which is dark aside from the moonlight peeking in through a window just out of her reach. When her eyes adjust, and she lets herself become fully aware of her surroundings, she realizes she's comfortable. Aside from a pin prick in her neck that stings just a little, and a lower back pain, she's fine.

There is a blanket draped over her, and she's laying on her back against a few fluffy pillows. If she didn't know any better, she would think she was in a hospital. The set up is certainly like one, from what she can see in the darkness. From the bed, Kate sees a sink, with fresh wash clothes next to it, and a bucket with a mop which seems...odd to her at first but then of course they want to keep the women healthy and cared for.

The _babies _healthy and cared for...

Kate's hands slip down to her large stomach, smoothing her palms around until she feels the baby who turns over inside her. The roll of this little being in her womb causes the skin of Kate's stomach to flex outwards, as if the poor little thing is trying to break through.

She wonders how many woman have been held in here. How many children have been ripped from their mothers and sold to families who have no idea the heinous things being done just so they can have their precious baby.

The idea of it sets her off and Kate lets out a sob as she struggles to sit up. She lets her back hit the wall, and curls herself over her stomach.

They want her baby.

Closing her eyes against a wave of tears, she clutches her stomach in her arms as tightly as possible, shielding her baby girl from whomever has kidnapped them. But Kate knows she has no fight here. No gun, and she's far too pregnant to even _begin _to defend herself.

But she's not far enough along for them... so why is _she _here? Her baby has another two months to go.

The baby kicks, strong and swift against the womb that was once supposed to keep her safe. Now it's more like a cage. Holding her there until she's needed... would they really keep her that long?

Kate's heart starts jumping wildly in her chest and she tries to get off the bed. To her horror, she realizes it's wet. As if in answering, a sharp pain shoots through her lower back, forcing her foreword, doubling over in pain, the smell of amniotic fluid rising up to her nose.

Panic shoots the length of her body along with another kick in protest. The baby. Kate cringes, riding it out. Maybe it's nothing... She rests against the wall, counting it out in her mind and trying to find out how far into labor she is. After several moments she stifles a scream, falling over on the bed and holding the underside of her stomach. She covers her mouth drowning out the echo of the room, and her screams of utter terror.

* * *

><p>Rick's eyes snap open, a gasp escaping his mouth and he leans forward in his seat. He's panting, coming out of some sort of nightmare he doesn't remember. Only that he feels terrified, and so lost, defeated. He lets his head fall against the window of the plane, taking in every breath he can, calming is racing heart.<p>

* * *

><p>She nearly fails in holding back a gasp for the fifth time in under half an hour. The baby is moving even more within her now, stretching in her confines, wanting to get out as if she senses the oncoming danger. "Please no, baby. Not now ..shh." Kate soothes. But she's stricken into horror when the pain escalates, as if it could get any worse.<p>

As she rides it out, eyes narrowed, teeth bared she realizes she is running out of time.

* * *

><p>The elevator doors open to a long stretch of hall. Ryan and Esposito get off, charging down the passageway and nearly colliding with Lanie when they barge through the double doors.<p>

"Have you heard from her yet?" Esposito asks at the same time Lanie opens her mouth.

"Have you found her?" She's near hysterics, it's been almost an hour since she hailed a cab for Kate.

"No." They both say at the same time, and Lanie sinks into her chair, crumbling in on herself.

Ryan falls against a nearby wall, looking down at his shoes, arms crossed and his blue eyes wide and moist. "We found the van." He says into the silence that has fallen, aside from the small sobs from the tiny M.E and stressful sighs from his partner.

Lanie lifts her head, but her eyes do not convey any excitement what so ever. Ryan didn't sound happy about it. "It was dumped wasn't it?" She asks, not bothering to wipe her eyes.

Ryan nods his head gravely, and Esposito sends a pile of case files flying across the room.

"Dammit!" He yells, the sound echoing and sending Lanie into a fit of sobs.

"It...it's al-all my fault!" She cries.

Both men move towards her. "Chica." Esposito wraps an arm around her. She buries her face in his chest, clutching at his shirt.

"It's not your fault, Lanie." Ryan tries to soothe.

"y-yess."

"Listen to me." Esposito lifts her chin, "It's not."

"How could you know?" Ryan tries again. "None of us knew they targeted her, and we don't know why."

"She got too close with the van." Esposito says after a moment.

Ryan nods, lifting a finger to his chin in thought. "Yes, but the difference between Kate, and those other victims, is that-"

"They were homeless."

"No one was looking for them." Lanie pipes in.

"But we are."

* * *

><p>Kate's breathing comes out ragged, sweat breaking out on her forehead, temperature rising. Her pains are coming more quickly, intensifying. But she tries to keep herself calm, thinking about Ryan and Esposito finding the owners of the van. Tracing them to...wherever she is, and they will be here...soon...hopefully before this baby decides to make an appearance...<p>

But the longer she sits here, bed damp beneath her, the more her hopes slip from her. It's been over an hour, her labor is farther along than she initially thought...and, she's too weak and fragile to escape.

She brings a hand up to her face, pushing it through her knotted hair and freezes. In the quiet of the room, Kate starts to hear voices through the wall. A man talking to a woman, but it's all muffled. She slides to the edge of the bed, landing as carefully as she can onto the floor. Looking around, the only thing maybe even slightly useful, is on the other side of the room. Taking a deep breath she starts to move. Maybe she can get over there and back before her contractions start again. They come more often now and the pain that envelops her is excruciating. She doesn't know if she can keep quiet if another wave hits her.

Gritting her teeth, Kate makes her way across the large room. When her hand wraps around the handle of a mop, she almost sobs in her tiny victory, turning around to make the trip back. Halfway across the room, holding a hand out to the wall for leverage, it happens. Unbelievable pain rips at her, sending a horrific scream from her mouth.

There is a pause in the talking, and the footsteps are heard down the hall. Kate's hit with yet another and she falls into the far wall with a crash

The door opens revealing a woman in a ski mask. "Go get the syringes." She yells to her counterpart, walking into the room.

Kate watches as the woman looks towards the bed, finding it empty she whips her head around to be met with a swinging mop head.

Kate pushes off the wall, finding whatever strength she has left, and shoves the woman further into the room. When she hears the whoosh of air from the assailants lungs leave her, Kate shuts the door, locking it and runs down the hallway. She banks to the right, finding a kitchen and a sliding glass door. She gives it no other thought, not the weakness in her entire body, or her baby kicking frantically against her confines as she pushes through it, stumbling off a low porch and into the cold night of an approaching autumn.

* * *

><p>Rick steps into his hotel room with a sleeping Alexis in his arms. He lays her down on his bed, foregoing changing either of them into pajamas and just falls into bed beside her. Pulling the blanket up over her, he curls up on his side on top the sheets.<p>

He's beyond tired, feeling as though he's been running the miles he's flown a crossed the country to get here. His heart beats erratically and panicked in his chest, an aftermath from his dream he still can't remember. Only that he felt a sense of doom, something that has seeped out into his reality, leaving him hopeless.

* * *

><p>Her breaths come out in hollowed gusts, her feet carrying her deep into the dark woods of... she has no idea. But she needs to get as far away from those people as she can. Her pants cling to her legs, cold and wet in the night air, and her swollen ankles barely support her tromp through the quiet dark woods. The only thing to guide her is the stars and the moon, something she hardly ever gets to see in the city, but given the circumstance, she's not going to stop and enjoy it.<p>

When she feels as though she's put enough distance between her and the house, she slows falling into a nearby tree when another pain hits her, shorter this time. Not good. She ignores it, looking back at the house that is ever so slowly falling from view and starts running again. Letting the fear and adrenaline guide her, she gets lost amongst the trees and underbrush.

Above the sound of her heavy footfall and gasping breaths, her ears are met with a back door creaking open and then shutting with a loud echoing crack into the night. Kate gasps out in horror. Not too long after, she can hear the running of feet, two sets. One farther from the other at another crack of the door.

"She can't have gotten too far." The woman yells into the trees beyond.

"What are we going to do with the baby?" The man replies, already out of breath as his large feet stomp through the woods.

Kate keeps moving. Turning right to throw them off, trying not to trip over herself as each new contraction doubles with every few feet into the woods.

"You mean if it's even still alive. It's too early." She grumbles. But the voices fall away as they stop and survey the area, giving Kate enough time to turn slightly again. She jogs through the pain, holding her belly with one hand as she keeps up her escape.

The large thick tree trunks keep her shielded for the most part as she can't help but slow down once more. "Almost there, baby." She whispers, even though she has no idea where 'there' is.

But she keeps moving, only stopping once when she almost trips over a root. She looks down at her stomach, no longer moving, and she bends slightly over, pressing her hand deep into herself and waits. No movement, no response.

Kate holds back a sob, forging onward through the woods, trying not to think about the sudden silence of her baby girl. Soon the night falls further over her, the sounds of crickets and an owl in a tree she passes. And what's that? A car. She gasps out in relief, picking up her pace but when the headlights come and go, she stumbles forward, falling into a thicket and hitting her head on a rock as she crumbles to the forest floor.

"Over there!" One yells hearing Kate land defeatedly to the ground.

Kate moans, her body shaking, pain coming and going in long waves. She drags herself through the dirt and bushes blindly until she finds the pavement. She claws her way onto it, nails digging into the asphalt and ignoring the trickle of blood from her forehead. But she knows it won't do her any good. It's a long stretch of road, surrounded by trees and forest.

They are in the thick of the woods.

Kate rolls over onto her back. The pain becoming more severe and frequent, and she knows the baby is coming. Her face screws up on the urge to push, but she resists. Terrified to have this baby on the side of the road. No way of knowing what is going to happen to them.

It starts again. And she pushes this time, feeling the baby more than she ever has before. As her body stretches and throbs in pain, a wave of dizziness ensues as she fails to muffle her cries.

"Here she is!" Suddenly they are upon her, her vision blurred and all she sees is black, and the dark eyes of her captors.

"No!" Kate lets out a horrific sound, not being able to stop herself from pushing.

"Sedate her!" The man yells to the woman.

"No forget it! This baby is coming whether we want it to or not." The woman kneels infront of kate, taking hold of her knees with a death grip.

Kate arches, head rolling back against the ground when she feels the woman invade far into her personal space.

"Hold her down!"

Another sound rumbles through Kate chest, mournful, and deadly as the man tries to hold her to the road by her shoulders. But Kate has no more fight left in her. The escape and the labor has taken it out of her.

"I see the head!" The woman says excitedly, and Kate hears the man make a sickening sound of glee.

"Pleaase." Kate moans, watching with tears in her eyes, dragging it over a splitting pain until it becomes too much, and she falls back onto the pavement.

And then it's all over, the pushing and the labor. "I got her." The woman is saying as Kate tries to lift her head. "Give me your jacket."

"She's not crying." The man points out, removing his jacket and handing it to his partner in crime.

"Shh." The woman hisses at him, wiping the tiny form with the sleeves and then wrapping her in it. Kate gets a small glimpse of dark hair, bluish skin unmoving, tiny mouth and nose, _her _mouth and nose... But the baby's eyes are closed, and she still utters no sound, nor moves.

He lets Kate go, leaving her on the ground, the pain more like a horrible ache deep in the depths of her body, her soul, when she still does not hear the living cries of her baby girl.

"Is it dead?"

"Shut up, we need to get her back to the house, she doesn't look good." The woman sounds sullen, Kate's unsure if it's for her baby, or a lost sale if she doesn't make it.

Another moan leaves her body, the last one she has left at the thought of her baby having lost the fight. She was so strong before... A fighter just like her...

"What do we do with her?" The man nudges his head towards Kate, bleeding on the ground, as he hovers over the baby.

"Leave her, she won't last long." The woman replies, turning away with the lifeless bundle.

Kate vaguely hears their footsteps, fading out against the slowing pound of her heart beat, the blood leaving her body as they keep walking away with her baby into the night. Leaving Kate to die.

* * *

><p>She wakes in darkness. Familiar voices filter through the crack in her door, and she closes her eyes again, straining her ears to listen.<p>

"Were did you find her?" She hears her father.

"We..didn't" Ryan replies.

"The hospital called us when she was brought in." Esposito says.

"A woman found her on the side of the road in upstate New York... called 911."

"Is she going to be okay?" Lanie's voice is heard, barely audible.

"Yes," A doctor pipes in, Kate hears his footsteps. "She's lost a lot of blood, but we've got her on plasma and we have four units on stand-by if she needs them. Right now, we are worried about infection because of where she was found, but for now, I think the greatest problem will be her emotional state... She has suffered an _enormous_ trauma, so I want to have her meet with a psychologist as soon as we can get her stable."

She hears her father sigh heavily, imagines him leaning in his chair with his face in his hands.

"And the baby?" One of the others asks, her father having fallen silent.

"I truly believe she wouldn't have survived... given the prematurity of her birth, the state in which Ms. Beckett was in, and the environment... I'm sorry, she's gone."

"NO!" She turns away from the door, she doesn't believe them.

Covering her stomach with her hands she tries to feel for her...As though all of this was a horrible dream and she's woken in the hospital, about to give birth to her beautiful baby girl. But when she feels nothing, not the strong active kicks, nor the stretching of the tiny being once inside her, Kate's mind flashes to her struggle in the woods. One hand comes up to her forehead, feeling a bandage there, and she can vaguely feel a dull ache of her body, the chill of the night that will forever be evident in her soul.

She doesn't hear anything, eyes focused off into the distance, staring at the lifeless form in that wretched woman's arms. Kate remembers her babies dark hair, and beautiful face wrapped in a jacket in the middle of the woods. Smooth eyelids that refused to open and show Kate the life fighting to survive...

Kate's eyes drift upwards and looks at her own monitor, hearing only _her _heart beating. She closes her eyes tight. She's gone. Her baby girl is gone. Her throat clamps up and her mouth opens, letting sob after raking sob rack her body. Hot stinging tears slip down her cheeks and soak into her gown and hair. And as she lets the thought of never experiencing motherhood, of never watching her baby girl grow up, Kate closes off, burying herself deep in the ground at the foot of the wall... and lets herself break.


	13. Chapter Twelve

_**Chapter Twelve**_

It's beginning to become a routine, wake up after a night of restless sleep, and go through the motions of getting ready for work. Shower and dress without much real thought of doing the actual task, and then somehow find herself at work. The difference is that although she might be unaware of these numb motions she seems to be going through...

No one else is either.

Not to mention they are watching the downward spiral, unsure of how or when to stop her as she pulls out the case file from a box she keeps under her desk. Oftentimes they find her reaching inside during lunch or a particularly quiet day and looking over the files countless times hoping that she will see something she didn't before.

They see the bags under her eyes, the sag in her shoulders, and the loss of weight. All four of them stand in Captain Roy Montgomery's office and watch her through the blinds.

"How long has she been at it today?" Lanie asks, the wariest member of this silent support group. She pushes herself to the front, pulling down a blind and watching as Kate stands by her desk.

All four stand by and watch as Kate posts a photo from the box onto the empty side of the murder board, bring a pen up to her mouth, while the other absently moves to her stomach, but before her hand can rest there, her hand crushes in a fist and drops to her side along with the pen to the holder. She falls heavily to her chair and all five of them sigh at the same time.

"Since this morning." Ryan says. Behind Lanie the Captain checks his watch.

"Which...we were here around seven, but I am sure she was here at five." Esposito adds, shifting from one foot to the other, arms crossed over his chest.

The captain sighs heavily, dropping his own arms and walking around his desk to take a seat. "We need to pull the plug." He says.

Everyone turns away from Kate, whose head is in one palm propped on her desk. "Sir?" Ryan asks, his body twisted from the window but not fully turned towards his superior. His eyes dart back to his fellow grieving detective every now and then.

"He's right." Esposito turns away from the window completely, ignores the sad look on Lanie's face as she lowers her head. "We've let her investigate this long enough..."

"Even a little behind her back."

"And there is _nothing_..."

"We won't find anything."

Lanie bows her head further, chin touching her chest. "Nothing?" She asks not turning from her friend who is now staring into the box.

'I'm sorry, Dr. Parish but we have found no further evidence. That house was empty, no news of any infant dropped off at a hospital or signs of human trafficking." The captain informs her.

"Why didn't you look into that before?" Lanie asks, edge in her voice.

Ryan walks up behind her. "We have, Lanie. We got a guy in from vice to pose as a buyer the moment Kate went missing...but we got nothing..."

"Which means, they..." Esposito trails off.

Lanie looks over her shoulder at them, one tear threatening to fall. "Which means...they had nothing to sell."

* * *

><p>He stands outside his apartment building, right at the curb in front of his building. His eyes scan the spot all the way up to the entrance where a doorman now stands, and back again. A woman, whose identity will not be released, only that she was a member of the NYPD, was taken right in this exact location. Right where he stands.<p>

Rick looks down at the ground, wiggling his toes in his shoes before moving his head to the shoes of the doorman. "Where were you that night?" Ricks asks, not looking at the man at all, but letting his gaze travel the path once again, looking for...something. As though the story is written in the invisible path in which this woman walked. Getting out of her car or cab, to his building...but why?

"I was helping a tenant into her apartment, Mr. Castle. Old lady Harper in 2C. She's getting old and her hands shake so bad she can never get her key in the lock."

"That was nice of you." Rick remarks now walking to the curb where he stops and looks up at the street.

Was she going to his particular building? Did she know someone in it or was this just a stop she was making before she continued on down either direction of the sidewalk. And if so...where was she going?

"I try, sir." The doorman replies but by the end of a usually self preserved statement, he falls flat and bows his head.

Rick turns towards the man, letting his features soften from his deep concentration and intense pondering. "You are a good man Eduardo." He says walking from the curb and stopping just before the entrance.

The man looks up into the sincere eyes of Richard Castle. "Thank you sir."

Rick gives him a smile and a nod before staring at the entrance for a moment. The night he was on a plane halfway across the country, a woman seven months pregnant got snatched off his street in front of his building. A woman whom by The Deliverers standards, was not far enough along for their liking. So why her?

"Let it go Richard." Rick gasps, a hand flying to his chest at the same time he hears a chuckle from Eduardo.

"Mother! Don't scare me like that, my god, with the happenings these days you think you could warn a person first." He throws a look at Eduardo who shrugs his shoulders.

"What you didn't hear the clicking of my heels down the sidewalk?" The redhead walks around him, pressing her heels into the pavement harder to prove herself.

Rick shakes his head, "I don't know how I ever missed it, being as you are so loud."

"Oh ha ha." She replies with a flourish of her hand. "What are you doing out here?" She then asks looking around as if it's the most absurd thing.

"Was wondering the same thing, Ms. Rogers." Eduardo pipes in.

Rick glares back at him. "I was finding the story, mother, if you must know."

"Oh, well." She tosses her hair to one side. "Well there isn't one. She's been found from what I hear." She starts her face looking more somber as she continues. "Fully recovered...although."

"What?" He asks.

"The baby didn't make it... the poor dear." She sighs.

Rick frowns looking up and down the path he's worn down the last hour. "Who?"

"Oh I don't know, her identity is sort of a mystery." She shakes her head, her earrings jingling.

"I thought she was from the NYPD?" He tilts his head to one side.

"I wouldn't want my pain plastered all over the news, would you?" She asks.

"My _everything _is plastered all over the news." He replies flatly.

Eduardo makes a sound behind them in sad agreement, and Martha nods her head once more. The sounds of the city consume them as they just sort of stand there. That is until Rick yawns, his mouth hanging open and a long tired moan escapes into the space between them.

"Isn't it a little early for you, kiddo?" She then asks, one hand on her hip.

He finally closes his mouth and checks his watch, nearly six am. He raises an eyebrow. "And you, mother?"

She looks away.

"Ohh walk of shame!"

Eduardo laughs, covering his mouth and coughing.

* * *

><p>"That's enough." Kate turns from the murder board, now every scrap of her case plastered all over it in a jumbled mess Lanie will never understand.<p>

Behind Lanie, are the boys and the captain whose standing in his office doorway with his arms crossed. "What is this?" Kate asks standing upright, staring at Lanie who was the first to speak.

Kate tosses a glare at the weakest link, whose mouth was open to reply. "I...we...the captain..." Ryan stammers and then looks helplessly at his partner.

"Kate, go home." The Captain steps into the bullpen.

"But si-"

"Go. Home. Take a few more days off." He looks at her, not as her superior, but as a friend, a consoling father who has stood by long enough and watched her slowly sink into a rabbit hole.

"Your running yourself thin on leads we don't have." Esposito moves to the board looking at it with pity and anger.

Kate follows his gaze, looking upon it with vigor and possessiveness. "What about the guy in vice?" She asks.

They all go silent. A collective breath inhaled at the same time. "Sweetie." Lanie says softly, reaching out her hand.

No one wants to say it. No one wants to tell her that there is no baby to find. No one wants to be the bearer of such tragic news because they know how she will take it. They all know what will happen once it's out there. But they also realize that letting her carry on as if there is a baby girl to find is almost just as cruel.

Ryan steps around her desk, his blue eyes consoling and pained. "Beckett."

"No." She says stepping away from him and Lanie's reassuring hand. "Don't.. please don't say it." She shakes her head, moving back until she hits the board.

Esposito steadies it as it tips back a little. "Let Lanie take you home." He says softly as he takes a photo from the board, placing it into the box.

As he goes to remove everything else Kate pounces on him. "NO!" She rips it from his hand, squeezing herself between him, and the case. "Don't touch it!"

The bullpen hushes all at once. Even the phones stop ringing as Kate guards the whiteboard, arms spread out and glares at everyone even as tears threaten to fall. She's shaking her head as the three men move in on her space, slowly, as if approaching a timid wild creature.

"Kate." One of them says, but she's unsure who, her head shaking so vigorously and the tears blurring her vision.

"Kate, hunny." It's Lanie now, stepping close, tentatively with a hand slightly outwards.

Kate reaches down, wrapping a quivering hand around any part of the board, feeling the cold metal against her hot flesh. "Please, Lanie." She begs. It comes out as a moan, her head bowing so far forward Esposito has to catch her.

"We're taking you home." He says, wrapping both arms around her shoulders as Ryan prys her hand from her crutch.

She feels herself being lifted off the ground. "No! Please, don't...pleeaaase!" She cries out, thrashing a few times in his arms as he maneuvers around the desk glaring at every single person he passes on his way to the elevator. The Captain and Ryan follow as Lanie slumps against the desk, hand over her mouth, and covering a sob as her friends agonizing cries echo throughout the bullpen.

* * *

><p>It's hot in his hand, burning his flesh as he stares unfocused at the steam. It rises from his coffee mug, wispy and almost transparent in front of his hollow blue eyes, and he feels like a pit. As though nothing could fill him, nor wake him from this...brooding flow of...numbness he seems to be feeling today.<p>

Maybe he's just tired.

But he's not in the mood for a pick-me-up. The warmth of the mug in his hand, nor the enticing aroma isn't very appealing to him this morning. He just feels... lost or empty. Without a clue as to why, but here he is, face in his palm, neutral and impassive expression as he feels...

It's undefined, just some sort of state he woke up in, something he tried to shake by theorizing down on the streets a few minutes ago. But no matter how hard he tries, he still feels this way. He has been steadily feeling it for the past few weeks and now, as he sits alone in his kitchen...it seems to have swallowed him whole.

Maybe it's writer's block, a frustration from having finished his latest novel and now has to think up new plots and scenarios for the daring devil himself, Derrick Storm. A chore, more oftentimes than not. Something it often resembled when Rick is forced to do when he otherwise has nothing to write about.

It's around that time when Gina will be calling on him for the first chapter of the next novel, and Paula will be carting him around even more to promote it. Even though he technically just got back a few days ago.

Maybe he's lonely...It's getting close to that one year mark from the time he got divorced. Divorce can be a lonely place and although Paula has made sure it hasn't been for him... countless blondes and nights out in various clubs is not going to fix the aching in his lonely heart. Nor will it make him forget the one person on this earth, aside from Alexis, who could repair it.

He can't stop dreaming about _her_. He sees her almost every night, but now, when she appears in his sleeping hours, her beautiful green eyes are sad. Mournful and devoid of the life he once witnessed in them.

And he wakes up, not only does he ache for her, for her touch, and the person he never got to know, but he also feels the sorrow from her eyes deep within him. So again he comes to the conclusion, pushing his coffee mug away from him, that he is just lost, and he might as well embrace this... nothingness deep in his soul.

* * *

><p>Kate stares at the coffee Lanie places down in front of her...she's waited so long for this small cup of steamy goodness. And yet, she can't bring herself to even look at it. The steam rising, coating the rim with hot condensation, and not even the sweet aroma entices her.<p>

Not for the cost...the cruel memory of why she was not allowed to have it in the first place.

And now...as she turns away from it completely, spinning in her chair to stare out into her empty apartment. Her hand goes to her stomach, an old habit. But she is not met with the round happy belly or the swift kicks of her unborn baby girl.

There...there is no life growing inside her...not the beating of a tiny heart, so in tune with her now broken one.

Only the numb, faint existence of her own, misguided ghost. Her heart is lost. Like her soul, never to be found again because the only thing that could ever bring it back, guide her into living again...would be her own daughter.

Kate dreams of her, them. A life with Richard Castle. A life she never would have thought up for herself, and yet, dreaming of it every night has made her realize that it's something she deeply wants. But waking up to an empty crib on the other side of her room, and the silence of her apartment...makes her feel as if she lost them all over again.

She doesn't find anything worth it anymore. Not her job or her existence. Because what else is there to live for? For the past seven months she's revolved her entire world around the idea of a baby and how her whole life would change. A change she was no longer afraid of. Now...though, without that, she no longer knows what to do. Everything is up in the air and she feels so helpless and lost.

'You're not going to tell him are you?" Lanie's quiet voice asks. She's just walked out of Kate's room and holds up a blue bathrobe for her.

Kate stands up from the island pushing her coffee further away from her and letting Lanie hold the robe up for her as she pushes her arms inside. Wrapping it around her, she looks to her friend, shaking her head and walking to the couch which she sinks into. Lanie stands, looking upon her with something that runs much deeper than sympathy. But Kate can't seem to care.

She rests her hands on her stomach, looking into the tear filled eyes of her friend. "There is nothing left to tell." The broken woman finally says, choking back a sob.

Kate bows her head, her chin touching her chest as her thumb caresses the emptiness inside her. She has nothing left. _Feels _nothing except the quivering of her own skin and the sobs that begin to rack her body. She has only the flatness under her hand and the aching deep in her soul.


	14. Chapter Thirteen

_**Chapter Thirteen **_

She feels it before she opens her eyes. That knowing of another set of eyes watching her, looking over her as she slept not so peacefully. She had tossed and turned, not quite having a nightmare but it wasn't happy either. An in between, an indifference to the fate in which she lived in but she tries to shake the memory of it from her bleary mind. Instead she wonders briefly how long the other person beside her has been here when she knows that she had gone to bed alone. Falling into the comfort of her sheets, not bothering to change out of her work clothes.

Taking in a small breath, she forces her eyes to remain closed and the fib of sleep to keep her from the words she doesn't want to hear. The sympathies, so she ignores it for a moment, taking stock of her surroundings behind her eyelids. Listening to what's around her, feeling it out, hoping for that something she soon realizes is still missing.

And like every morning since she woke up in the hospital, Kate slides her hands to her stomach, an awful pang in her heart. It beats hard and pulsing against the inside of her chest when her palms do not rise but stay flat. As a tear slips, slick and warranted down the side of her face, she hears a small gasp echo out into her room; unsure if it's from her own mouth or the person she knows to be watching over her.

Kate turns her head. Opening her eyes, she's met with a pair of soft brown ones, and a tear track unlike her own.

Lanie had slept on the other side of the bed. Her body curled on her side as far away as possible. And even though she was in fact, in Kate's bed with her, this was her way of giving the healing woman her space. Otherwise, she's been hovering.

Kate moves over, the sheets tucked so tightly around her that her whole body is snuggled in deeper as she settles onto her side. Cocooned and safe from the world for which she would rather hide from. Lanie sees this and finally chooses to say nothing. Now is not the time for a lecture. Instead, she just blinks at her quietly in the shadows of Kate's silent room, offering only her presence as comfort.

Kate wishes it was enough...having her friends, her little family stand by her and offer what they can, but there really is nothing else they could do. Unless one of them shows up on her doorstep with a bundle, her baby girl alive and well. Then Kate is dead to the world.

Looking at Lanie, Kate sees the condolences in those usually fierce brown eyes now sullen by tragedy, witnesses a final tear losing the battle as it travels down her face and drips from her nose to her arm positioned under the pillow. In those eyes her dear friend says it all. Not just sorry for her loss, but grieving for the life they never got to meet.

"I know." Kate says, watching as Lanie's head shifts downwards, her eyes falling on the empty crib across the room.

Lanie doesn't say it but Kate knows that in her mind she's saying she wishes she could have seen Kate's baby girl. Held her niece in her arms and gushed about how beautiful and how much she looked like Kate.

That maybe if she was there, she could have done something. That this would not have happened if she hadn't forced Kate out onto the dangerous New York streets in search of Richard Castle.

Where would they be if she had waited another day? Would Richard Castle be here beside her, refusing to let their baby girl sleep in the crib? Wanting her so close that the three of them would breathe the same breath?

But the crib lays empty not because she is beside her and the warm body across the bed is not Rick. Kate does not blame anyone for these circumstances other than the evil people who took her baby from her.

Another tear escapes and Kate moves closer, their heads resting on the same pillow, and grips Lanie's arm affectionately. _Don't be sorry_she wants to say, but somehow finds it incredibly difficult as a painful lump forms in her throat.

Lanie shakes her head, blinking away another round of moisture. _But I wasn't there for you._Her eyes say, face pushing into the pillow so Kate cannot see.

"You are now." Kate whispers, squeezing her arm.

Lanie nods, turning onto her back and sighing heavily. "Are you hungry?" She asks after a long pause where they both just breathe together, taking comfort from the other.

When Kate says nothing, Lanie turns her head to see her staring at her stomach, thumb rubbing slowly along the flat plane. "No..." Kate says, lips pouting and chest rising with heavy breaths. "What time is it?" She then asks, finally peeling her eyes from the emptiness.

Lanie sits up, taking her phone from the end table. "Almost ten in the morning."

Her voice is so quiet when she speaks again. It lacks the luster and deep cop undertones. She can see how taken off guard Lanie is by it all, and tries to soften her own features to sooth her.

"Don't you have work?" Kate sits up a little, frowning at her friend.

"I do... I am only a little late." Lanie replies crossing her legs in front of her on the bed.

Kate tilts her head to one side and gives her a skeptical look.

"You're more important, baby." Lanie leans forward, pushing a loose strand of hair from Kate's face to tuck behind her ear.

Kate continues to stare at her disapprovingly. Thankfully but otherwise not wanting to be babysat. "Go, I'll be fine I'll just..." She stares across the room, not meaning for her eyes to find that crib once again, "lie here." She then says turning on her side once more and bringing her knees up to her chest.

Lanie pats her leg. "I'll have the boys check in on you in a few hours." She says sliding off the bed.

"Don't." Her voice rises a little. " I'll just be asleep anyway." Kate yawns, eyes scrunching and she smacks her lips, mouth dry and sand like.

Lanie crosses her arms shaking her head slightly. "I'm going to make you breakfast before I go. It will be in the kitchen...you better eat it." Lanie warns turning to the door and giving her that signature 'I'ma smack you.' look.

Kate nods, having no intentions of following orders.

* * *

><p>It's peaceful beneath this tree. As though nothing could touch him here. The conundrum that is the world is lost to him, instead of the one he creates upon his page. Heavy quick scrawl is written in his notebook that sits upon his lap, fingers grasping a pencil as he writes longhand. His stories are full of great mystery, and yet, hope and justice. For the life outside of him, the one that still lives and breaths past this sanctuary, does not always carry that hope, a faith in humanity. And so, he writes his own.<p>

He does not take notice of the people around him. The wind tugging at his hair or the ever changing leaves that dance in the wind. Autumn is upon them, an array of colors, vast and inspiring.

But as a breeze picks up, he is overwhelmed with an unknown awareness. Rick lifts his head, pencil left on the busy page, and looks up into the branches of this lovely tree. It's the only one in the park losing its vibrant green, turning to various shades of yellows and oranges, a spark of red. He breathes it in, the air and the pull towards this particular tree in the whole park.

There is something about it, he thinks, setting his hand flat along the strong bark, feeling the rough edges, and yet sensing the smooth interior underneath. It's alive and well as he is, if not a little worse for wear. It grows stronger everyday, this lifesource he leans on, supporting him, as if guiding him to a place he should be, could be.

Rick closes his eyes, rubbing a thumb over the bark steadily, he can feel it breathing, as if coming to life against the palm of his hand. It's pulse coinciding with his own.

* * *

><p>She lies there longer than she intended. Feels like it's been more than all day, ignoring the phone calls and knocks at her door, which she assumed was Lanie. Kate wants to grieve on her own. Feel the tear stains dry and tight on her face, wallow in the emptiness inside her. She needs to, for the life she has lost deserves such recognition. A permanent place in her heart no matter how much it hurts, <em>aches<em>deep in her soul.

Kate also knows, that she needs to get up. Not move on per se, not forget, just breathe again. She wants to be okay again, she thinks as she slowly sits up in bed, pulling her legs from the tangle of sheets, and finally setting them on the ground.

Her legs are unsteady as she stands, and she falls back on her outstretched arm, catching herself as the bed sinks against her feather light weight. She aches all over, her muscles taut beneath her tired skin, and her stomach growls in its constant protest.

Life needs to continue onward, and so she wills herself to move. Take that first step in truly recovering, because if she doesn't... she may never again. And she takes it. Slow, and quivering towards her window. Stepping carefully in the darkness of her room. Pulling back the curtains she sees the sun fading over the trees.

She blinks in the light, adjusting to what her eyes are trying to show her. It's a beautiful autumn evening, the skies alight with color, mirroring the few trees whose leaves are ever changing, just like her.

It's a sign, she thinks as she opens the window, breathing in the life of the season. It washes over her, waking an awareness in her she thought was gone. But it's here in the wind, in the air of the world she's been hiding away from.

It's breathing. Strong and swift like a pulse. Like the one steadily pumping the life back into her body. She's back, she's coming around.

Kate closes her eyes, breathing in as it does, feeling the flutter in her heart, strong and pulsing within her being. And as she steps away, moving on to her bedroom door, she continues to take it in. Opening her door, she looks out into her apartment, seeing her family scattered about her living space like the leaves on a fall day.

She lets a small smile grace over her lips when they look up, and realizes, that in the embrace they provide, she'll eventually find her way.

* * *

><p><em><strong>Thirteen years later.<strong>_

* * *

><p>Her dark hair falls freely along the branch, green eyes closed and face angled up into the shade this massive tree provides. The shadows of the thin branches dance across her cheekbones, dipping into the hollow of her cheeks. There is a slight curve of her lips, one side drawn in between her teeth as she listens to what's down below her dangling feet. To the calm and relaxing water that rushes along the riverbed.<p>

This is her sanctuary.

The place she escapes to, for the life she leads is not as free flowing as the river nor as lenient as the wind blowing in the tiny weeping leaves of this willow tree. It's unknown, always uncertain of where her feet will carry her. Her future is undecided, at least to everyone else.

She knows exactly where she wants to be and it isn't here. It's in the stories she turns to, the ones she can't stop writing about. The fantasies and daydreams she slips into, blinding her of everything else as pen meets paper. Just as she does now, sitting up and turning herself so she can lean against the steadiness of this tree. Her friend, strong and the only thing that has remained stable.

Brushing a stray hair aside, her green eyes focus on a fresh page. Tilting her head, she ponders. What will her heroin concur today? But after a while, nothing comes to her. Only the sounds of the goings on in the house across the field, the birds in the trees, and the river below.

Maybe she can sneak into the city, do some investigating of her own, put herself in her characters shoes. It's a half an hour ride on her bike...she could run off for a few hours and be back before anyone notices...

She nods her head at her inner agreement, Just a few hours...closing her notebook and tucking it under her arm, she swings both legs over the thick tree branch. She grips it on either side of her thighs, letting herself fall backwards until she's upside down.

"Autumn!"

She sighs, blowing the the exasperation from her lips, and drops down into the tall grass. Listening, she stays crouched, maybe they didn't see her.

"Autumn you better get your skinny butt in here!"

Autumn pops up from the grass, seeing the figure of a woman standing on the back porch. Her arm is up over her eyes, shading them from the afternoon sun. Reluctantly, Autumn brushes the dirt from her pants, stepping forward and swishing in the swaying green grass, out from under the shade of her tree and into the field for all to see. She walks, head held high until she reaches the porch. Her foster mom remains standing, hands on hips and a disapproving look on her face.

The young girl tosses a look over at the garage longingly where her bike leans up against the side. She sighs, heaving her shoulders up and then down before climbing the steps.

"Don't even think about it." She's scolded as she steps into the kitchen of the orphanage.


	15. Chapter Fourteen

**Chapter Fourteen**

Autumn stares out the window of her bedroom. The tree she uses to escape down onto the lawn, sways slightly in the wind. It's leaves, and little white flowers dance and push amongst each other as this strange spring weather assaults them. It's nearly summer, but the air is chilled like fall, leaving her wrapped tightly in her fleece blanket as she stares into the night.

The moon rests high and large in the sky tonight, full and promising as she thinks about her next move. Not that she will carry it out...things always seem to get in her way and there is only so much a thirteen year old orphan girl can do. But, she does feel like now is the perfect time to be in the city. She can feel it in every fiber of her being. And as she stares at the moon, white and glowing, she wonders if they see it too... feel it as she does.

It's ponder most often... every night in fact as she lays her head upon her pillow every night. What it is that made them give her up. Or even if she was given up...Did one want her and not the other? Was her other alone and young and unable to care for her?

Autumn so badly wants to know the story. All she has is the tale of her newborn self...dropped off by some unknown person on the doorstep of the orphanage.

It was just the beginning of fall, the leaves were just beginning to change, and the night had already fallen over New York. The air was chilly, and thick with something ominous and forbidding. And yet, there she was. This tiny little miracle who was stronger than she was given credit for. This new born baby girl, not more than a day old, bundled up and placed on the steps.

When they found her, she was fast asleep under a small pile of autumn leaves that had gathered there on the wind. And on that night, abandoned but not forgotten, she was taken out from under the cold autumn sky, for which she was named.

* * *

><p>It's mid afternoon when Autumn slips out of sight. Swinging her long leg over the seat of her bike, she tugs her jacket tighter around herself, and looks up at the place she's called home the last thirteen years. The beautiful home of her foster mom, Isabelle Waters.<p>

Autumn has tried not to become attached to this place, or Bell, but even now, with a foster meeting going on today at the house, she feels as though she's losing her claim here. A new kid is about to join the misfits... but as she peddles off down the street, she knows this kid will probably be living with her and Bell.

She lets these feelings blow off her as she speeds down the street through her neighborhood. She's not supposed to care. She's only supposed to have her eyes set on the bigger picture.

For Autumn, this is her temporary home... just a stop to where she is actually going. The place she's meant to be, with her birth parents. She doesn't listen to the teasing of the other kids, all younger than her, and still up for adoption. Because they can all go to other families. It's what they want... but the only thing left for Autumn is to be found.

And to do that, she needs to know where she came from and she believes that it's here. She can feel it, drawn by the energy of the city. And she knows it to be for a reason. Everything in her mind happens for a reason. She may not understand it, but she holds onto the hope that she's heading in the right direction.

So any chance she gets, Autumn escapes here.

Riding on her bike through the city streets, wondering if she's ever ridden past her mother or father. If they frequent the same places she does, if she's stood in line behind one of them in Remy's, the place she now ditches her bike.

Standing here in the back alley, leaning her bike up against the brick, Autumn turns to the street. With cars and taxis speeding by, the city is as alive as ever. The wind sweeps in, gathering up her hair and she closes her eyes, lifting her face into it. Her entire body buzzes with a cosmic awareness, and she opens those smiling eyes to the world of endless possibilities.

"Hello little miss." Autumn is greeted when she walks up to the counter in Remy's

"Hey." She smiles kindly, head tilted to one side as she brushes her long dark locks behind her ear.

"What's on the agenda today?" Arty, her favorite waiter, leans over the counter, arms crossed as he puts his weight onto them.

"Hmm." She hums, bring a hand to her chin, tapping her finger on her lips.

He gives her a soft smile, humming a tune to himself as he goes to get her usual. "Well it's early yet." He remarks with a bob of his head, and a wink of his kind green eyes.

"Sure is." She then replies grabbing at the strawberry shake he hands her.

"Well, stay out of trouble." He warns as she pays, a scolding look on his face.

"Always." Autumn says, tossing him a mischievous smile and bouncing on the balls of her feet towards the exit.

She skips to the door, straw in her mouth as she sucks the delicious strawberry shake into her mouth, not looking where she is going and collides with another girl. Autumn stumbles back, and a few coins scatter from her pockets, pinging against the floor tiles.

"Sorry."

"Let me help you."

They both bend down together, nearly crashing heads. "Sorry." Autumn says again, looking up into the blue eyes of an older redhead. She bites on her lip and stands up straight.

"No worries, here you go." The girl replies handing Autumn her change. She gives her a smile and moves on past her to the counter.

"Why hello, Ms. Castle." Arty greets just as Autumn is shooed out the door by the afternoon crowd.

* * *

><p>She's comfortable among the stacks. Thy tower high above her from behind, and infront as she leans back against the bookcase. A pile of comic books sits beside her, from her favorite comic book store, and in her lap, lies an edition of Edgar Allen Poe.<p>

She flips through the pages, knees drawn up to her chest. The only sound she hears is the whispers of the few other people in here today, far on the other side of the library, and the quiet peel of paper as she fiddles with the edge and turns them, catching on her jacket until they rest.

Her lips move as she reads silently, head tilted down and completely enraptured by the poem before her. She stops, bringing her lip into her mouth and staring off at the opposite bookcase. Do any of her parents like poetry...can any of them write?

She so desperately wants to know them. Where she gets her adventure, her curiousness and gift for the pen. Sometimes, as she writes, she can feel them. Feel their energy run through her arm, prickling at the corners of her mind as if perhaps they are also creating stories and images from words.

Autumn puckers her lips, pulling a strand of long brown hair around to look upon. Does her mom bite her lip like she does? Twirl her hair and is she also well known for her death glares, the pouty lips?

Whose eyes does she have? For hers are green with flecks of brown. She's told that, despite the crease that, more oftentimes than not, finds a place between her brows, Autumn, does in fact have smiling eyes.

Whose trait is that?

She's teased for her long legs, admired for her hair, and often found to be one big mystery. There is something in that, she thinks, as she closes the book, placing it in her hiding place with a tiny scrap of paper to mark her spot. For what is life, without a little bit of mystery.

* * *

><p>She's lost track of time. She can feel the panic building within her as she watches the sun slowly sink behind the buildings around her. It's not helping that the pesky police officer a few feet down the street is eying her. He sits in his car, his sharp blue eyes not so subtly watching her through his rear view mirror. He has kind eyes, she can tell, but it's the concern on his face that bothers her.<p>

The light is still red as she waits on the sidewalk, trying not to look back as he continues to watch as if he knows. Knows that she's not allowed to be out here, that she's alone. But she's not helpless, that much she knows for sure. But it takes a cop like him to ruin everything for her. Him and his hispanic partner who now comes out of Remy's holding a bag and three coffees. The third making no sense to her, since there are only two men. He looks in at his partner, and then at her, before getting into the cruiser.

Autumn looks up at the light. "Come on, come on..."

The car turns on behind her, her heart jolting in her chest, and she fist pumps the air when she's given the go. She quickly pushes off on her bike, and speeds down the street towards home.

When she gets there she jumps off, throwing it to the side of the house and takes the back steps two at a time before crashing into the kitchen. It's dark, aside from the light on over the sink, and she can hear the TV on in the living room.

She checks the clock on the stove, almost six o'clock. She's been missing for more than four hours and somehow she knows, from the pit in her stomach, that she's doomed. And with this feeling rising, she takes a tentative step further into the room, breathing hard from her mad dash home.

"You're in trouble!" A small voice shrieks, and a tiny girl pops out from behind the doorway.

"What the-"

"Autumn!"

"Now you've done it." The Autumn says pointing at the girl.

"Now you've done it." The creature mimics, her black hair down her back in a long braid. She stares at Autumn with beady eyes in her little round head.

Autumn says nothing, just glares at this annoying little girl, and thumps out of the kitchen and towards the voice. To her dismay, the girl follows, copying her strides and stomping her feet up the stairs loudly as they both make their way up.

She stops abruptly in the middle of the hall, the girl colliding with the back of her legs and falling onto her butt. "Hey!"

Autumn laughs quietly, and then enters her room to find Bell. "No need to tell me where you've been.." The older woman says from the bed. "Come sit. I have something I would like to talk to you about."

"If it has anything to do with that..little raven, then I can already guess." Autumn flops down onto her bed beside Bell, crossing her arms and sending another glare at the girl, who ducks back behind the door.

"Her name is Robin."

"Still an annoying bird..." Autumn mumbles looking beside her. It's then she notices all her notebooks. All of them have been pulled out from under her mattress, some on the floor, the rest on her bed.

"Even so... she's here to stay and you'll just have to-"

But Autumn isn't hearing any of it. She shoots up from the bed, snatching up every last notebook and hugging them to her. Her face contorts, first in rage, then in confusion, before she settles with a straight line of her mouth, and swallows back a lump in her throat.

These are her things...her secrets and her desires. "What was she doing in my room!" Autumn yells, pointing a viscous finger at the tiny girl who runs off down the hall.

"Autumn, calm down."

"NO! You let that little sneak into my room!" They hear a door slam, and Bell stands calmly from the bed.

"Listen to me." She tries to soothe, resting both hands on Autumn's trembling shoulders.

"Did you read them?" Autumn asks, staring up into the woman's brown eyes with a challenge.

Bells stands straighter, dropping her hands pulling her auburn hair out of her eyes.. "I won't lie.. I read a few."

Autumn's mouth hangs open, and a tear slips from her eye. "How could you?" She asks, wiping her face with the back of her sleeve. "I trusted you..."

"Autumn."

"Get out!"

"If you would only list-"

"I said get out!"

Bell looks upon her sadly, offering her hands up in surrender and leaves her room shutting the door behind her. "They are really good." Autumn vaguely hears before she sinks to the floor of her room.


	16. Chapter Fifteen

**Chapter Fifteen**

The wind beats against the window of his study, whistling through and disrupting the flow...which was hardly there to begin with. With an aggravated growl through his teeth, Rick beats down on the backspace button with his index finger, forceful with each letter. The taps become quicker and quicker until he is yet again, staring at a blank document.

He's having a hard time coming up with a scenario for a certain British Spy, who's just _not _cooperating with him today. He's no Derrick Storm.. that's for sure, who he killed off more than ten years ago. And as he sits here, he's almost terrified of becoming bored with said spy as well.

He's far past the third book deal, and they had given him an extension. Then they started making movies out of Derrick Storm and even gave the detective his own line of comics.

But as Richard Castle stands from his desk, smoothing a hand through his graying hair...he wonders if this is all there is. If the boredom, the being _told_ to write it...is what turns him off from wanting to _write _at all.

Looking out at the windy streets below he realizes that It's not fun anymore. He's no longer inspired.

When he was younger, he used to sneak off to the library every chance he got. Sit amongst the stacks and marvel at the amount of books at his disposal. He was amazed by all the stories, and became curious about how they were written. What motivated these authors into creating such masterpieces and epic tales?

He soon found himself wanting to be just like them...

Maybe that is where he needs to venture to again. It's been so long since he's been there, surrounded by all his favorites.

He needs new inspiration. A mystery he can't solve. That's where the fun is, the adventure he seeks. Rick turns from the window, a spark in his smiling eyes, and with one last look at his blinking cursor, he pushes the lid down on his laptop, and grabs for his coat. He sitting in his office, is no place to find his muse.

* * *

><p>Autumn wakes with a stiff neck, and turns over from her napping place on her bedroom floor. Her notebook is still clutched in her death like grip, the binding having made a deep impression in her palm, and under her chin where she had rested it against the top as she cried herself to sleep.<p>

Keeping her eyes closed, she takes stock of her position. She can tell what time of day it is from the glare of light on her face, as she lays on her floor, head poking out from end of the bed. It also helps, that the smell of pancakes has wafted up the stairs, and through the crack under her door. She hums, a smile creasing those once pouty lips, and stretches her arm out like a waking cat. She yawns then, stretching out again, with her notebook still in one hand, and then rubs her eyes with the other.

Her eyes finally open, blinking several times to take in the light of the room. It's dim purple walls, her curtains shading most of the light, and her books and various possessions cast shadows around her. The people from her posters stare at her a little less eerily at this time of day, and she hops up onto her bed, re-pinning one of her Derrick Storm posters back up at one corner. It's then she notices, jumping back down, that all her other notebooks have been stacked neatly at her desk, with a folded piece of paper atop them.

That crease between her eyes deepens, and she tilts her head to one side wandering over to investigate. Upon further inspection, she lets out a small gasp, and her face softens considerably before her heart drops just a little. It's a drawing, from the little raven, of the two of them with the word "sorry" written at the top.

"Oh great." Autumn mutters, biting her lip and folding the paper back up, sliding it into her notebook. She sighs, tucking her messy hair behind her ear, and opens her door, heading downstairs and wondering how she's going to keep hating the little thing if she does stuff like this.

* * *

><p>"Bro, get over it." Javier Esposito says shoving his partner to one side as they get out of the elevator.<p>

Ryan's brow creases and he looks down as they both make their way to their desks. "You know what? No, I won't." He then says, fixing Espo with a half glare as he squares his shoulders. "I'm going to keep an eye out for her.. what if that was one of my kids?"

"She's not _your_ kid, and it's not your department, if you're so concerned take it up with child services, but don't make me sit in rush hour traffic in the same. damn. spot _every_day to look for her with you. Not to mention, she's probably someone's kid and lives around the corner." Espo huffs, trying not to raise his voice and plops hard into his chair.

Ryan shakes his head, setting the extra cup in his hands on Beckett's desk, and then sits in his own chair. "There is just something about her, doesn't she look a lot lik-"

"What's up guys?" Kate asks walking in with several files in hand and dropping a few onto each of their desks.

"There's this gir-"

"Nothing, he's just sticking his nose in other peoples business where it doesn't belong." Espo raises his eyebrows at his partner to shut up, who frowns and drops his head as he looks at the files.

Ryan picks up his coffee, glancing over the rim. "What's this?" He asks in a low voice.

Kate stares at the two of them for a moment, arms crossed like a mother regarding her two sons who were clearly just having a fight."We have a case." She says, noticing her coffee and bringing it to her lips. "Lanie got a body in yesterday, and suspects foul play." She takes a drink waiting for their reactions.

"And what's the cause?" Espo asks, also flipping open the file.

"Death by Anesthetic..." She answers, sipping again but then sitting on the edge of her desk, "but here's the strange bit, there was a small amount of Pitocin in the blood work along with the Morphine."

"But our victim is male.." Ryan starts, flipping up the paper from the file and setting it back down with a tilt of his head. "Why would there be a labor inducer in his tox screens?"

Espo crosses his arms and gives him a look, with that raised eyebrow of his.

"Hey, I watched my wife give birth to two beautiful girls thank you..."

Espo shoots up from his desk snapping his finger. "Pitocin...that sounds familiar.. why does that sound familiar?"

The sound of a cup hitting the floor and paper scattering everywhere gets their attention. Both look over to see Kate, frozen in place, arms hanging at her sides and her face twisted in horror.

* * *

><p>"Good, you're awake, breakfast is on the table." Bell says passing Autumn in the hallway with a basket of laundry.<p>

Autumn holds her notebook to her tightly, afraid to let this one go. It holds all her recent adventures, and she would die before anyone else got their hands on it.

Speaking of which, she enters the kitchen to see the little thief already at the kitchen table. Their eyes met, green with brown beady ones, before the brown drop in submission. Autumn rests her stories over her lap as she sits across the table from the girl, who's pushing her pancakes across her plate, while fiddling with the tip of her braid. She refuses to look up at Autumn at all.

The older girl picks up her fork, eyes watching tiny fingers ring the long black braid. Jet black like a crow, or a raven...and she reminds her of Edgar Allen Poe and his tales of The Raven. Autumn finds herself curious about this creature, perched in her home, and wont go away.

"Never more." Autumn whispers, stabbing through her stack of pancakes.

"What?" The raven's eyes dart up through her eyelashes.

It breaks Autumn's heart what she sees there... herself, only this girl is more timid now than Autumn had ever been. "Nothing..." She replies after a moment, seeing the girls frown deepen.

"Why do you call me a Raven? My name is Robin." The little girl asks quietly.

"Still a bird..." Autumn mumbles, looking into blinking brown eyes.. The girl _is _rather adorable.. when she's not being a sneak. "Do you not like it?"

"No.. I like it.. I've never had a nickname before.. unless you count being called a worm...or shrimp or..." She trails off, setting her fork down.

Autumn sighs, sensing a presence at her back and knows that she must make amends with this creature. And she _does _feel guilty for being so harsh.

"I made a s'more with eggs once." Autumn says into the silence of the kitchen.

"A s'more?" The little raven asks, her lips curving ever so slightly, head still dropped.

"Mm hmm." Autumn replies nodding her head and pouring an obscene amount of syrup onto her pancakes. "Still not sure what to call it..." She then says, watching, through the steady stream, the distorted image as the girl lifts her head completely.

The Raven giggles. "Gross!" She falls back against her chair

"It _was_ gross, Robin!" Bell answers walking into the kitchen and making a disgusted face at the two of them. "And _she _made me eat it!"

"Ewwwwww!" The little raven yells out, shrieking with laughter.

Autumn smiles through a mouthful of pancake reaching for the syrup again.

"That's enough, you're sappy enough as it is..." Bell half scolds ruffling Autumn's hair and taking the syrup from her. "From what I read.. the amount of sap could coat my pancakes for a lifetime."

Autumn's face falls, a pang shooting through her heart and pushes her chair away from the table. Bell watches her stalk out of the room and then looks down at the only girl left, whose mouth has dropped open into an O.

"Uh oh." Quoth the raven.

"Uh oh, is right. Finish breakfast.. I'll be right back." She says placing a soothing hand on her head before following Autumn.

"I don't want to talk to you right now..." Autumn says from the stairs.

Bell sits beside her. "You can't run from every confrontation, Autumn... you're tougher than that." She smooths the hair behind her ear and waits her out.

Autumn doesn't pull away, but she doesn't look up or say anything either.

"Look.. I'm sorry.. I just.. you're such a mystery, and I feel like I don't know you anymore...ever since..."

"You told me how I got here?"

Bell nods. "Mm hmm...and ever since.. you've been...what's the word..._investigating_and disappearing into the city."

"They are there! I know it!" Autumn exclaims, hugging her arms tighter around her notebook.

"I know.. I know they are...but you also know you will always have a place here."

"I know.. but...I want...I want to-"

"Find them?" Bell asks, tapping the notebook.

Autumn nods, twisting her cheek to her knee to look at Bell. "Do you think I can?"

"Oh sweetie," She says, cupping her cheeks in both hands. "I think you can do anything you set your mind to..and you know what.. I'm going to help you."

Autumn perks up. "You are?"

"Of course, now.. if you let me.. we can start by publishing one of your pieces in the New York Times."

Autumn tackles her with in a hug, wrapping her arms around her neck and squeezing the notebook between them. "Thank you...that's …." She chokes up a little. "Really sweet."

"You're welcome!" She says into her hair, squeezing her tight. "Now, go change, I need you to bring a book back to the library for me." She says, with a wink, shooing Autumn up the stairs.


	17. Chapter Sixteen

_**Chapter Sixteen**_

Autumn walks happily down the street. An extra spring in her step as she stops at the local newsstand and picks up the latest copy of the New York Times. She balances Bell's overdue book under her armpit, and smooths the pages of the newspaper between her fingers. Feeling the smooth thin paper between against her skin, she sighs, and pictures her own short story displayed in its own column... for everyone to read.

Even her parents.

"Hey you!" The woman behind the booth leans over, surveying her with a critical eye, and tries to shoo her away with a folded up magazine.

"Leave her be." Larry, the homeless guy who sleeps in the adjoining alley, gets up from his post at the entrance and wanders over.

"I don't want her stealin nothing." The woman waves the magazine again, making Autumn back up and place the paper back.

Larry glares at the women, putting an arm around Autumn and steers her away. "I'll set her straight Autumn Skies." He says, nodding his head as he continues to guide her.

"What happened to Forrest?" Autumn asks, subtly brushing her jacket when he lets her go, and sits back into his trash bags.

"Didn't ya hear?" He says, shaking his head.

"Hear what?"

"Forrest's been murdered." He replies darkly. "Right down there." He points a grungy finger in the opposite direction in which she came.

When she looks up, she sees a Medical Examiner's Van, and an approaching cruiser, its lights flashing. It pulls up, sirens blipping a final time before it comes to a stop. Out steps the man from the day before, and his partner. They flash their badges at the yellow tape, and duck under.

As she looks on, Autumn finds her skin itching for the story. She waves to Larry, who's toothy mouth is agape in awe, and wanders down one of the back alleys to get a closer look.

* * *

><p>Lanie Parish frowns at the body before her. She's crouched in an alley a few blocks from the newsstand, the guy who used to run it, now lays dead. First look tells her nothing, no bullet holes, no defensive wounds.<p>

If she didn't know any better, she would have assumed he died of old age. Maybe on his way to his morning shift, and just...had a heart attack and passed on. But on further inspection, her purple gloves stark against his graying flesh, she sees a puncture mark in his neck. She doesn't have to think too hard to realize that this man is connected to the victim from yesterday.

Standing up, she peels her gloves from her hands with a snap, and then looks up to see a pair of green eyes staring at her from behind a dumpster. A skinny girl with dark, long brown hair stands up straight with a gasp. Lanie would swear by it if anyone asked her, but those green eyes flash at her, wild and untamed before the girl runs off.

Her heart flutters in her chest, her hand flying there as if to steady it to a calm. The girl..She looked... she had the same eyes, and that hair, those cheekbones...it was as like staring into the face of a younger-

"Lanie, what have we got?"

Lanie jumps, "Dammit girl! You scared me, don't sneak up on me like that, are you trying to give me a heart attack?"

"Like our vic?"

Lanie juts her hip out, "wha-"

Kate points down at the body. "Our victim.. are you okay you look like you saw a ghost."

Lanie looks back at the now empty alley, and then to Kate. "Or something like that..." She mumbles before she crouches by the body again. "Not a heart attack, look here."

Crouching down beside her, Kate pulls her hair away so it doesn't touch the body. "Needle marks." She says, standing back up and pulling her hand through her hair before tossing it over her shoulder.

Lanie looks over, eying the tendrils, before receiving an odd look from Kate. "Mm hmm, my guess? Morphine overdose, and more lethal given his age."

"Poor Forrest." Kate says shaking her head and looking down at the kind old man she once knew.

"Mm." Lanie hums, but not quite in agreement. Not understanding why this man would be involved in what seems to be the case that ruined her friend. "Let me get him back to the morgue.. run a tox screen and see if we are looking at the same MO."

Kate nods turning away as Lanie steps up beside her. "Who would want _him _dead? He's just a newspaper vendor..."

"I don't know, sweetie." Lanie replies, taking one last look over her shoulder before they exit the Alley.

* * *

><p>"Hey dad." Alexis' voice filters through the phone as Rick makes his way to the library. He had gotten sidetracked at a crime scene a few blocks back, but is now just about to enter the Library.<p>

"Hey, Pumpkin, How's being back at school?"

"Would it be wrong if I say I already miss you? I mean I just got back and my classes start in an hour and I am officially out in a couple months bu-"

"Hey, take a breathe." He laughs, stopping outside the entrance. He hears her do what she's told and grins. "Of course you can miss me...bored here without you."

"Is a certain British spy not cooperating?"

Rick sighs leaning against the side of the building. "No he's just..."

"Oh dad, don't kill him off okay?"

"Wasn't planning to." He chuckles as a young girl bounces by him and into the library. "It's just.. I think I need to find a new muse."

He hears a ruckus in the background and then a muffle before her voice is too loud in his ear. "Mm.. Maybe. Where are you now?" Another muffle like her hand cupping around the receiver.

"At the Library about to go in...Hey why don't I let you go, it sounds like it's about to get busy over there."

"It is, a class just got out, and I do need to go, but I'm glad you're out looking.. I think it'll be good for you."

"Thanks pumpkin, Have a good class."

"Love you."

"Love you too."

He smiles at his phone as he taps the end button, and pushes off the wall and heads on into the library.

* * *

><p>Down in the morgue Kate taps her foot anxiously on the tile floor. Her arms cross and uncross over her chest as she paces in front of Lanie. The ME. peers up every now and then, brown eyes following the detective as she tries to keep herself in control. But with every sweep of her shadow across the body on the slab, Lanie knows that this is going to tear her up inside.<p>

"Kate." She says with a sigh as she grabs a syringe from the instrument table beside her. Rolling up her sleeves and then snapping her fingers before inching the needle towards the victims exposed neck.

"Huh?" She stops, hand midway to her mouth as she bites her lip.

She pushes it in a few inches from the other needle mark. "How's Josh?" Lanie tries for a subject change while she pulls back on the syringe.

Kate looks over at her, biting down on her thumb and then staring at the blood filling through the needle. "He's gone... again."

Lanie stops with the plunger halfway up. "A-_gain_?" She asks, head bobbing to one side, her entire face clearly not impressed. "Where did he go _this _time?"

"Africa" She replies defeatedly.

"Africa?"

"Yes, Africa!" Kate throws her hands in the air and paces again.

"For how long?"

"A year and a half."

"Baby..."

"No. I know.. I'm just..." She hoists herself up onto the empty gurney, her place for deep thoughts with Lanie... and slaps a hand over her thighs in resignation.

"Done?"

"Yes Done."

"And what did he say, when you told him to stay?"

"I didn't."

"And why the hell not?" Lanie pauses again with the plunger.

Kate looks away. "Because...I don't know if I want him too."

Lanie gives her a look. That one mixed between a 'Really? Are you sure, and 'I'm sorry.'

Kate shrugs, "I wasn't going to go with him...it was like Will all over again... my place is here.. I _need _to be here."

"Why?" She asks this.. because she knows exactly why.

Kate looks up, teary eyed. "What if.. she's.."

"Kate.. sweetie, you can't keep doing this..."

"Lanie..."

"I know.." Lanie replies softly, staring into the wild, sad green eyes of her friend...the same eyes she saw this morning in the alley.

Maybe holding on... is not such a bad thing. Seeing that girl this morning, so much like Kate.. a younger version, with those smiling eyes of Richard Castle. Maybe she _is _out there...Maybe Kate is hanging onto the right kind of hope. And who is Lanie Parish to step all over that?

Lanie gives her smile. "It'll be alright." She then says, soothing, and low.

Kate wipes at her eyes and nods once before dropping her head, and her hands to her lap.

The morgue falls silent, as Lanie proceeds to fill the rest of the vial, and pull the needle from the dead flesh. "I should have the results tomorrow..." She nearly whispers as Kate slips to the floor. "And honey." Kate turns trying to pull herself together. "It's been thirteen years...and these victims are not pregnant women."

"No.. but they were involved.. _he _was involved, a man I thought was kind, and sweet. What if he was one of them Lanie?"

Lanie caps the vial and places her hand on one hip, "Then I'll say it.. at least he's gone now..." She says matter-of-factly. Not caring how that sounds but if one of those sons of bitches is now dead, then.. "Good riddance." She adds with a curt nod.

Kate says nothing, giving her a tight lip smile before staring down at the body of Forrest the old newspaper vendor, and pushing through the double doors.

* * *

><p>The book slides smoothly down the shoot as the young librarian behind the desk gives her a soft smile. Autumn smiles back walking quietly on the balls of her feet, weaving through the tables and other people with their books, along all the genres, and all the various tales until she reaches her favorite section, and sneaks in between the bookcases.<p>

She sinks down with a happy sigh, leaning forward and pulling her book from beside her, and opens it to her book mark. But her eyes and thoughts are not on the words printed upon the page. But in the alley, to Forrest dead on the cold dirty ground.

She's not naive to blood and murder.. she's read it, seen it on tv when Bell wasn't around...but to actually _see_ it. And it's not like she hasn't been curious. Wondered why people do such things to each other, what drives them to such...madness. Or even worse, are they not mad to begin with, or do that just do it to...Autumn shudders, she doesn't even know, couldn't even _begin _to understand the workings of a killer's mind...

She shudders again, shaking her head vigorously and tossing her hair every which way as she tries to shake the image of the deadness in his eyes...so void of life.

The book..

Read the words, think of something else.

Bringing her knees up, she cradles the book, one finger on the page as her eyes begin to read across it. Her lips soon join the march, the dance that picks up in pace, as she is a fast reader.

The tale of The Raven, and the long lost Lenore. To feel such a loss and need to write about it, Autumn can surely understand it, and finds herself whispering as she reads, her voice rising the deeper the plot thickens.

"Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling," She recites, in perfect rhythm to the set of the poem. "By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore." She reads slowly aloud, finger gliding under the words.

"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven,  
>Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the Nightly shore -" She briefly wonders where the little girl she had dubbed <em>the raven <em>had come from..."Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!"

"Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore." Autumn startles, slamming the book shut and looking up to see none other than Richard Castle.

* * *

><p>Kate's head snaps up, her heart fluttering from a sudden awareness. This prickling in the atmosphere around her, feathering its touch along her skin, and raising the goosebumps of her flesh.<p>

She stops mid chew, zoning out with her carton of fried rice in her lap, and the tv on low. She closes her eyes, letting her head fall back on couch, and breaths in, opening her senses as the memories of this nostalgia, fill her.

It's not an altogether new feeling, as she sits up straight on the couch, spreading her legs out. Instinctively, her hand drops to the carton in her lap, falling to her stomach, her palm flush against the flat plane. She draws herself back, to the last time she felt the fluttering heartbeat of her baby girl. The life so real and tangible inside her.

And now, even though her hand rests upon an empty stomach, Kate can feel her. This is how she knows that her baby girl is alive.

It's transcendent. And it drives her in the best way possible.

Kate breathes in once more as the fluttering begins to fade. Just that small touch, like a passing spirit, or the universe's way of keeping her going. Giving her something to live for. And when she's left with just the beating of her own heart, she lifts her head, and stares into her empty apartment.

So here she sits in the late afternoon, but instead of feeling forlorn, like she has all day, Kate remains calm, and somehow soothed by the little moment. She's no longer stubbornly driven and difficult...which is why the boys sent her home early, she hadn't been able to focus. The case was too fresh, and they wouldn't have anything new to go on, until the results of the tox screen came in tomorrow.

She felt like a hindrance anyway. Staring at a sparse murder board and that night.. that horrible night in the woods flashing in her mind.

Kate has to keep reminding herself that these victims are _not _women...and that there must be an explanation for that labor inducer to have been in that man's system...

Kate shakes her head, dropping her fork into the container, and continuing from her pause of chewing...but what if...She begins to wonder, swallowing the rest of her mouthful of rice. What if...Forrest was one of them...who killed him, why.. and if it was his partner.. then..maybe she can find them.

And if she finds them... Then she can learn the truth about her baby girl.. She refuses. Kate still refuses, despite what she tells them, despite what therapy taught her, to believe that her baby girl did not survive. Kate knows she's out there somewhere.

_She is... _Kate thinks forcefully to herself flipping off the tv and dropping the remote to the cushions. If what just happened is any indication, then everyone else is wrong...

She can feel her sometimes, she swears when she wakes up in the middle of the night she can feel her. Just like now, the fluttering in her heart as if the two of theirs are connected on the same heart string. And it makes her wonder in those moments, what she's doing, what she looks like...how's she's being treated.

Kate stops in the middle of her kitchen, hand over her heart. What if she passed her on the street? Stood in front of her at Remy's.. sat a few tables down from her, and whoever her family is...

What her name is, her favorite books...She wonders if they like the same things. Ice skating, strawberry shakes.. the color purple...

She sighs, dropping her hand back down and throwing out the empty carton. Maybe she's as stubborn as she is. Unable to really let things go. A fighter on the outside but tender and partially broken on the inside.

But she hopes she's not broken...She hopes that, whosoever eyes she has, green or blue, Kate hopes they smile just like her fathers. That she's not _too _serious as she is, but maybe more playful as she senses Richard Castle to be...

If only...Kate wishes, yawning into the back of her hand and walking into her bedroom.

And as she curls up, suddenly very tired, She ponders just a little bit more; through the _what if's _the _maybes_ and all the _if only's_... Daydreams about a life with her daughter and Richard Castle, before she slips into sleep, and her dreams let her live the way she's always wanted.

If. Only_._


	18. Chapter Seventeen

_**Chapter Seventeen**_

_There is a place, no one can see_

_High atop my willow tree_

_The only place I can truly be_

_The words within I set them free_

_There is a place I'd never show_

_A place where I often go_

_To tell the tales only I know._

_There is a place, from where I look_

_high above that cresting brook_

_Where I stay perched like a rook_

_My heart wrapped around my book_

_There is a place, only I can find_

_Nestled deep within my mind_

_searching for the ties that bind_

_There is a place, where hope will peak_

_In the words I dare not speak_

_For mothers touch upon my cheek_

_Is the very thing I seek_

_There is a place, in my dream land_

_Where sometimes I go and stand_

_Alone, holding my father's hand_

_There is a place, as yet unknown_

_A place I have not been shown_

_Somewhere I should have grown_

_The very place I would call home._

_There is a place, I know somehow_

_That waits for me and I'll allow_

_That it is enough, for now._

"Beckett!" Ryan yells across the bullpen. Kate's head snaps up, a blueberry halfway to her mouth and sees him standing by the elevator holding up a piece of paper.

She looks back at it, the small fruit between her thumb and index finger, having forgotten it. The _New York Times _is her other hand, folded over to a particular section that caught her eye today...and her heart.

It makes her feel...nostalgic.

For the ache this girl must feel, _Autumn_ _Skies, _is an ache not unlike her own. This girl has lost her parents, one way or another. Maybe she never knew them. But Kate can feel it. She knows it deep in her soul.

That want.

The same need Kate has always had to find her mother's killer, to reconnect with her father, and to find her daughter she knows to be out there.

This poem...speaks to her. For she knows that place. The place in her dreams where no one else can break her.

Where she heals...

With a sigh Kate drops the blueberry into the bowl, staring down at the poem on the page, and finally scoots away from her desk. Rolling it up she clutches it tightly in her hand as she jogs over to Ryan.

Her heart is pounding in her chest.

She's unsure, as she comes to a stop in front of her fellow detective, if it's the result from what she just read, or the prospect of breaking the case.

They need this, and from the look on Ryan's face it might just be the thing to nail whoever killed Forrest, to once and for all put these Deliverers in the ground.

For _good._

"You okay?" He asks after a moment

Kate didn't realize she hadn't said anything. Instead her hand rests upon her cheek, head tilted to one side as the paper unfolds in her hand. Her eyes have found the poem again, the name of the author rising some unknown awareness in her chest.

Maybe it was the familiarity in it. The hope this person seems to have while being so obviously lost in this world...just like Kate.

And Like Kate, they had found that place in their dreams they knew they could escape to. Where no one else could see or touch. For it is our dreams that make everything seem worthwhile. There is a tangibility to it that only a true believer can feel in their hands, and in their skin as they reach out for it.

"What have you got?" She finally asks, dropping the paper against her leg. She lets her hand fall from her face, to rest lightly over her heart. She can feel it beating against her palm.

Ryan regards her for a moment, more like a silent father figure then an younger brother, and then hands her the slip of paper. "Forrest's address. We've had a hard time finding it since he has no next of kin, and apparently has moved around a lot."

Kate shifts the paper under her arm and unfolds the address, trying to get back into detective mode, "but he was just a newspaper vendor, why would he have to move around?"

"He was involved..." Ryan says, voice dipping low. His eyes convey their worst fears, and he moves a bit closer for comfort. "The tox screens showed he had trace amounts of Pitocin. He had something to do with those kidnappings.. possibly even yours..." Ryan trails off waiting for her response.

She only gives him silence before pursing her lips and nodding once. "Have you gone there yet?"

Ryan shakes his head. "We were waiting for you."

"Thank you." She replies, a hand on his arm before pressing the button for the elevator.

* * *

><p>"Reading Poe again I see." Rick says, leaning upon a bookcase and looking down at the girl, her nose buried deep in a book.<p>

Autumn looks up, that smile on her face that always seems to take the breath right out of him. She nods, her hair bouncing around her angelic face, and then bites her lip. "Of course" She replies, leveling him with a look for stating the obvious.

He puts both hands up, as if to say 'my mistake' and sits down across from her, stretching his legs out in front of him. "Which poem are you reading today?"

"Don't you have someplace else to be?" She looks up through her eyelashes, a devious smirk playing at the corner of her mouth before her eyes dart back to the page. "A dream within a dream." She finally offers when she hears him blow a raspberry.

"Ah, 'Take this kiss upon the brow! And, in parting from you now," He recites, an exaggerated waver in his voice.

Autumn suppresses a laugh and raises an eyebrow instead, folding the book over her hand, and giving him another look. "I prefer the lines: 'All that we see or seem. Is but a dream within a dream."

"Hmm." He ponders, raising his hand to his chin. "I'll take it, and raise you a: 'Yet if hope has flown away In a night, or in a day,"

"In a vision, or in none, Is it therefore the less gone?"

"And is there?" He asks, inclining his head to her, and waggling one eyebrow.

Autumn removes her hand from the book. Setting it down beside her, she runs her finger along the spine. 'Never." She replies almost inaudibly, her eyes unable to meet his gaze.

His face softens.

"I agree..." He trails off, watching her. Seeing an innocence behind the tough exterior for the first time since he met her a day and a half ago.

"He's your favorite. I take it." Autumn says, the vulnerability has vanished, overtaken by the moxy she clearly possess. "Since you changed your name and all."

"A fan are we?" He smirks pulling the book towards him and slipping it into its hiding place beside him. "Only truly dedicated fans would know that."

She shrugs. "I guess.. I mean, I don't peruse the fan sites if that's what you mean." She then says, jumping a little on the defensive. Sure she has posters of Derrick Storm on her walls.. and his books hidden away in her closet...but she doesn't want _him _to know that.

"Ohh I bet you do."

"No." She replies, standing up.

"Oh come on." He gets up following at her heels as she rounds the book cases. "Let me guess, your Castlefreak1212?"

She throws him a look over her shoulder.

"Castle45?"

"Look." She stops, crossing her arms over her chest and jutting her hip out with her head tilted to one side. She's the image of a well put together thirty year old, standing here before him. _Not_, the thirteen year old girl she _actually _is. "Don't you have someone else to follow around.. A book to write maybe?"

Rick stops dead, nearly forgetting that he's talking to a girl, younger than Alexis even. That he's been driven the past day on how familiar she looks. That green of her eyes that's always haunted him.. and somehow, she has the same wild, untamed look about her as...

"I find you interesting...you remind me of someone..." He's amazed at how intriguing this little thing is with her love for Poe and obvious smarts no average teen possess. "And I wanted to tell you that I really enjoyed your poem in the New York Times. Not even _I _got anything published in there." He gives her a sheepish shrug of his shoulders and turns to leave.

"You did?" She asks.

He turns back. "You have a real talent...I would love to read more of your stuff."

Autumn looks down at her hands, fidgeting with a bracelet Bell had gotten her for her birthday a few years ago. "I would like that."

* * *

><p>Kate walks around the home of Forrest Jackman. A pretty normal old man, from what she can tell, aside from his scarce belongings. All he has is a small couch, a incredibly old tv set, and a coffee table.<p>

No pictures. No books, and nothing of sentimental value.

And there doesn't seem to be anything here that would account for his whereabouts the last thirteen years or involvement. Only that this has been his resting place for however long, and it doesn't appear that he planned on going anywhere again

She doesn't understand it.

A sixty eight year old man, living alone, working down the block at a newspaper stand.. and somehow being part of a horrific trade. Considering these living conditions, she wonders what he could have possibly gained from it. He obviously had nothing...in the remaining years of his life anyway. It's not like he kept it up. It _has _been thirteen years...

She closes her eyes, her memory flashing to those woods. It's all so vivid and blurry at the same time...The trees around her, her hand protectively on her stomach, the pain. Their voices...

And the only thing Kate can think of, standing in his kitchen, was that, he's no longer alive to tell her about that day...Where they took her baby, where she is now...

He could have told her where she is...

"Kate." Esposito pops his head out of the old man's bedroom. "You've got to see this."

Kate's brow creases, her hand dropping from her mouth where she had been chewing on her nails, and makes her way into the room. All the while cursing herself at how invisible he seemed to be even though she saw him practically every day..

It's dark, when she enters. The curtains drawn over a single window, a small dresser with a twin bed in the corner. The only difference between this room, and the other part of his tiny apartment, is that a picture sits on a small bedside table. Whereas he owns nothing else of sentimental value.

"Two things." Esposito says handing her a book.

"We think it's yours..." Ryan pipes in, as that crease between her eyes grows deeper. Kate crosses the remaining distance and takes the book in her gloved hands. and looks down at the cover.

It's a Derrick Storm novel. The same one Lanie had gotten her that day, and shoved her out into the night on a quest to find Richard Castle. And on further inspection, flipping the book open, her veins run cold, as a painful pang enters and exits her chest, sending her heart in an erratic beat.

It _is _her book.

The very same book she clutched tightly to her that night as she got out of the cab. The same exact book Lanie had snuck his address in between the pages..The same address that now flutters to the floor.

Her body is frozen.

She can feel her pulse in every inch of her skin as her hair stands up on the back of her neck. Bending down, she takes the paper, now weathered with age, between her trembling fingers, and stares down at it.

She can see it in her hand, not in the present, but there on the street in front of his apartment. She can hear the cars rushing behind her, the excitable thrumming of her heart thinking that that was it. She was going to see him again...He was going to know about his baby.. and that maybe..just maybe they could have been something.

There is a sharp intake of breath as her eyes close and she nearly drops the book to the floor. The memories assaulting her all at once. She had tried so desperately since then to keep them locked away. But standing in this room, the book in her hands, the paper between her fingers, Kate is shell-shocked.

Forrest was there.

He had eyes on her the entire time and she never knew it.

"Kate?"

She ignores Ryan and Esposito, who have been eerily quiet. The silence brings her back to that room, all alone on that bed...locked away until they were ready. If she didn't know any better, she'd think the bed was the same...small and cramped, pushed up against the wall...

Someone moves in her peripheral vision, and she lets out a breath, feeling the air rush almost painfully from her lungs as she looks up to find them both staring at her. She puts up a hand, nodding once to indicate she's fine, and then tightens her hold on the book, crumpling the paper in her fist before looking back down.

"There's more..." Ryan is at her side, sliding a picture frame over the book jacket.

She hadn't noticed him pick it up, and now shakes her head to snap herself back to them. "Is that?" She asks, pointing at the women in the photo.

Ryan and Esposito nod. "Simone." One says.

"The nurse from the free clinic." The other finishes.

The woman, in fact, is Simone. She has her arms wrapped around Forrest, her head on his shoulder as they sit together on a park bench.

Kate's jaw tenses, teeth gnawing at the inside of her cheek angrily as her hand begins to shake more violently. Looking up, she thrusts the picture at one of them, and stalks out of the room, yelling out the only thing she's ever been driven to do since that day.

"Find her."

* * *

><p>Bell sits on the porch swing, listening to the whippoorwill as he calls out into the dusk. She closes her eyes, letting her head fall back focusing solely on his call over the annoying creak of the bolts as she swings languidly back and forth.<p>

Running a hand through her sandy brown hair, she sinks deeper into the swing, letting the it lull her into a sense of calm. She expects Autumn home any minute, for once allowing her to disappear into the city. For Bell has a lot on her mind and would rather stay deep in solitude a bit longer.

It's quiet at the house today, Robin is spending her last night in the orphanage before she comes to live here with her an Autumn. And although Bell had a talk with the spritely thirteen year old about the little raven, she herself cannot help but feel as if things have come to a change in tides.

It's always just been her and Autumn, ever since that fall day when she found her on the stoop of the orphanage. This little baby girl wrapped in blankets, asleep under a pile of leaves as the sun dropped in the sky, casting the world in brilliant color.

Autumn Skies. She called her.

This magnificent little being with such spirit and hope. So tainted, and yet, untainted by the evils of the world... but as she grew older, she had let none of it tear her down. She wasn't a lost soul, she's just passing through. This is just a stop to where she's going, where she actually belongs.

Bell has seen many children go through the system. Some are still lost, others have found their way.. but none of them, are like Autumn.

Things are changing, that she knows for sure. Autumn is getting older, seeking more of an independence than she ever has before, and is undeniably driven with the need to be found. Bell cannot deny her, for she has no other reason to be skeptical of what she's after. Her parents could very well be out there.

And what that means for Bell.. is letting her go.

She doesn't know if she can do it. If faced with the reality, someday, possibly soon, Autumn will find her family. And there is _always_ the question, with any new adoption, or the kids going into different foster homes, of _who _these people are that want to claim them.

It's not uncommon for her to worry about what sort of people are caring for these kids...how they're being treated.. are they happy...Do these new families even deserve them?

Who could possibly deserve a girl like Autumn?

Why was she even abandoned to begin with.. what's the story?

If she's learned anything from Autumn these past years, it's how important the story is.


	19. Chapter Eighteen

**_To Rick: creating the journey takes time and patience.  
><em>**

_****Only a few chapters left guys.**  
><strong>_

* * *

><p><em><strong>Chapter Eighteen<strong>_

She can hear it, the sound of her teeth grinding together in her tense jaw. The way it picks up an odd rhythm with the beating of her heart. If she focuses enough, she might even be able to hear her eyelids swoop down every now and then.

But then again, maybe not.

She doesn't think she's blinked in the last half an hour. Her green eyes locked on the logo for the twelfth precinct in all its symbol of unity. Hoping, that any second it will rip apart, and out will come Ryan and Esposito, bringing in...that _woman._

They were right to send her back here...exiled to her chair to wait...She wishes she could tell herself that she's waited this long.. why not another few hours? But she can't. Not at the expense of her aching heart, and it's a shock that it's lasted even this long.

The wait has been killing her, slowly but surely... and the longer she sits here, staring at the elevator doors, the more terrified she becomes. What if she's held onto a hope that's not even there...what if...

Kate bows her head, sucking in a strangled breath through the painful lump in her throat.

What if...Simone has nothing to tell her. Only that Kate might have been living a complete lie the past thirteen years. What will she do then? If faced with the one thing that has kept her going all this time. What if there is nothing for her?

Bringing a hand up through her hair, she clutches at it, pulling the follicles until it hurts, and then lays her other hand over heart.

Still beating.

She's still here, still holding on...She can do this.. Stay level and everything will be fine...

The ping of the elevator nearly startles her out of her chair. Her head snaps up and she pulls at her hair as she flies from her desk. Her hands drop, strands of hair stuck between her fingers as her body reacts to the doors sliding open.

She vaguely senses Capt. Montgomery standing in his office doorway, no doubt watching her, waiting for her to make her move...and standing as those doors seem to open in slow motion, she can feel her resolve slipping.

What she sees first is Ryan, watches as his eyes seek her out once those doors hit home. She is momentarily sedated by kind blue eyes. The sincerity that shines in those depths as he looks out for her best interests. That despite how she must feel...betrayed even for having to sit this one out, he's sorry.

Kate holds onto that as long as she can...But as he moves out of the elevator first, his hand wrapped around the crook of a someone's arm...She knows it's not enough. Because looking into the face of Simone Potter, Kate Beckett knows no other way, than to dive head first into the mouth of her inner vengeance.

Before she knows it, she's more than halfway to the elevator, and the Captain has her by both her arms. Pulling her back as her teeth finally unclench and she's snapping viciously at the woman being yanked in the other direction.

She's blinded by her fury, can't even hear herself as she perseveres. Trying desperately to get out of the tight grasp holding her down, trapping her as the door to interrogation closes with Simone inside.

"Beckett!" Esposito catches her as the captain lets her go. She lunges around him, trying to bang and claw at the door. "Stand down." He orders, more forcefully as he holds firm to both her shoulders and pushes her back away from the door.

There is no stopping her, as her eyes bore into that door, knowing exactly who's on the other side and knowing exactly what they have done, and what they know. He has no right to keep her from ending her suffering once and for all, and she claws her way past him, grabbing at the door.

It's locked.

Damn it all if that impedes her. Grinding her teeth together, she forces all her weight on the one thing holding her back, even if she knows deep down it's not going to help.

Esposito finally stops her, stepping in between her wrath, and the impenetrable door, pulling her wrist as she once again claws at it like a lion ready to pounce on her kill.

"Stand. _Down_."

* * *

><p>She can feel him watching her as she stands at the mirror. Eyes fixed on Simone, as if truly seeing her for the first time. She notices the way she sits, everything a dead give away, down to cold defiance, shifty eyes, and the stiffening at certain questions or accusations.<p>

The captain makes a sound in agreement every now and then, crossing and uncrossing his arms, nodding his head, or frowning depending on how that wretched woman answers certain questions. But when Esposito brings up Forrest, it's then they all know they have her.

It's then it doesn't matter what she says from here on out. The only thing Kate hears is Ryan inform Simone that they found the syringes in her apartment, her fingerprints all over the book, and that she had the perfect opportunity to get her hands on both morphine and Pitocin. Not to mention her means of finding her victims.

The only thing left was motive. Why did she kill that man, and then Forrest. Why did they team up in the first place?

Kate doesn't care, as she switches from one foot to the other. Listens to all her reasons and only wants to hear one thing. She waits...wanting to hear her team rise to the occasion and ask what she cannot.

_Where is she? _What did they do with her little girl... is she alive?

But she gets none of these answers as Simone crumbles in her chair, and confesses to every last shred of it. And before she knows it, Simone is being hoisted out of her chair, and carted out of the room.

"No!" Kate yells, banging on the two way mirror.

Ryan looks up as he closes the case file...finally, and gives her a small reassuring smile. The captain is at her side then, as the door opens to reveal Esposito with the satisfied grin on his face.

Except, she doesn't want to celebrate with him. She wants to punch him in the face for not stepping up for her. And she rounds on him so fast she nearly gets in a good shove before it's Ryan who pulls her away, followed by the Captain who places a hand on her shoulder.

"You'll get your turn..." He says.

Kate looks at his hand on her shoulder, and then at Esposito who doesn't seem all too phased by her attack, if not more concerned for her.

"But sir." She rebels, pulling away from all three of them. "if I could ju-"

"No. Go home, cool off and you can have at her tomorrow."

_When you have a level head_. His eyes seem to say, but they all know that is not possible.

Not now, not when she is so close to the truth.

She says nothing, as she brushes past them, slamming the door on her way out.

* * *

><p>As she packs up the remaining evidence which will put away Simone Potter for good, Kate can't help but still feel that hole. The one left by her unanswered questions. That hole that has been slowly eating away at her since she woke up in the hospital, to an emptiness inside her.<p>

This was never supposed to be about her.

Kate sighs, placing the lid on the box and handing it to a rookie who will take it down to storage, and then makes her way to the break-room. It's about _them_, she thinks, pulling a mug from the rack... The victims.

But today, she lost sight of it all.

Her ambitions changed to selfishness...but then again, doesn't she deserve this just as much as those other victims?

The coffee pours into her mug steadily, and she takes in another breath, letting it out as carefully as possible even though it hurts. Rips at her lungs on it's way past her trembling lips.

It's finally over.

The case is closed, and she has found solace for those women who had suffered so greatly. She feels the pride in that, for they deserve their justice. Thirteen years of feeling as if she failed them, and it has finally lifted itself from her heavy heart.

Filling the gap.

Almost...

"Hey," Ryan says softly, drawing her attention back to reality.

"Oh." She says, tipping the coffee back before it overflows in her mug. "Hey..." She then replies, putting the cup back in the maker a little too forcefully.

"I'm sorry."

Kate looks at him, her head falling to one side in question. She can't rely on her own words right now, afraid of what will come out.

He moves next to her, getting his own mug and starts to fill it. 'For not-"

"No... don't be..."

"I just.. we figured..well... that you-"

"Kevin." She places a hand on his arm. "Like the captain said.. .I Just.. . I need to..." She sighs.. she's never been good at expressing herself, and so lets it hang in the air around them..

"I know." He replies, placing a hand on hers and giving it an affectionate squeeze. Letting go he moves to the door, and then stops, turning around, "Why don't you come over for dinner, huh?"

She looks down into her coffee, finger smoothing over the rim. "I don't know.."

"You can see the kids..." He says in the most enticing way he can. "Mackenzie has been asking about you." He then adds.

A smile starts to form on her face, and she looks up. "Well, I would hate to disappoint her."

* * *

><p>"Kate!" She barely gets through the door when Mackenzie runs at her.<p>

She bends down, opening her arms to the six year old, who's blonde curls tickle Kate's cheeks as she rushes into her arms, colliding with small intake of breath. The brunette wraps her arms around the small girl, breathing her in as the little thing holds on tightly around Kate's neck.

"How are you?" Mackenzie asks, leaning back and placing a hand on Kate's cheek.

Kate looks over Mackenzie's shoulder at Jenny as Ryan passes her there kneeling on the floor. Jenny tilts her head to one side with a small smile, a twinkle in her eyes, as a lump forms in Kate's throat.

"I am...okay," She replies placing her own hand on Mackenzie's "Thanks for asking." She gives her a smile.

Mackenzie seems to search Kate's eyes, piercing light blue into the depth of her green. "Your eyes have brown in them today." Mackenzie then says, moving her hand out from under Kate's to slide her thumb under Kate's eye.

"You're very observant." Ryan says from behind them.

"And considerate." Jenny adds just as a scream comes from the other room. "I'll go get her..." She says with a sigh, picking up a spit up rag on the way out.

"She's incorrigible." Mackenzie sighs, letting her head fall back to look at her father, who brings a hand up to his mouth to stifle a laugh.

"And apparently in her thirties." Kate laughs standing up and taking the girls hand.

Mackenzie nods her head vigorously, guiding Kate into the living room and sitting her down on the couch next to her. "Daddy says I have an old soul." She says, voice getting louder as the screaming continues.

"Well that is a very good quality to have." Kate agrees, tucking Mackenzie's hair behind her ear as she whispers into it.

"Dinner wil-"

The screaming gets louder as Jenny enters the living room, a four month old baby girl in her arms, spit up rag draped over her shoulder, pacifier in one hand as she holds the infant under her bum with the other.

"Still wont settle down?" Ryan asks as Jenny shakes her head. "Maybe she's hungry?"

Kate looks on, Mackenzie shaking her curly blonde hair at her tiny sister while covering her ears with both hands.

Jenny tries to soothe her, swaying side to side and bouncing her a little . "No I tried that...What's that smell?" She then ask, swinging her body around towards the kitchen, blue eyes wide.

"Dinner.. I got it." Ryan runs into the kitchen leaving the girls alone in the living room with a shrieking infant.

Mackenzie hops down from the couch patting Kate's leg. "Good luck." She says as if she's really going to need it, before skipping out of the room.

Kate shakes her head, a smirk playing on her lips and turns towards Jenny, who's still trying to soothe her baby girl. She's stopped screaming, but still whimpers in her arms, Jenny's fingers running through what little brown hair she has. The smile slips from Kate's face, her eyes closing briefly as she remembers back to another head full of brown hair...

"Kate?" Jenny asks, looking up as the little one starts to cry again.

"Hmm?"

"You okay?" She moves closer.

"Yea..I'm fine... I just."

Jenny puts up a free hand, shaking her head once. "I know..." She looks back down at her baby, and then back to Kate, whose staring. "Would you like to hold her?"

"Oh.. no.. she's probably better off with you... I might just make it worse.."

"It won't make a difference.. my little Ivy, has been nothing but fussy all week.. nothing will calm her down." She says with a sigh.

Kate's heart leaps, and she stands from the couch. "If you're sure..."

"I'm positive." Jenny replies sweetly, carefully moving Ivy into Kate's arms. "Just.. keep moving around, she seems to be a little more calm if you're walking." She smooths a hand down the little girls back as she whimpers.

Kate nods, situating Ivy in her arms, her tiny hands in tight fists as she cries, curled up with her head in the crook of Kate's arm.

Jenny gives her a smile, and heads into the kitchen to help Ryan, leaving Kate alone with Ivy who's still crying. Kate tries to calm herself, she's shaking a little, but takes in another breath, smelling Ivy's hair. She closes her eyes, and starts to move about the living room, swaying from side to side.

"Shh, shh." Kate soothes, bouncing her carefully.

Ivy doesn't seem to hear her, and pulls back a little from Kate, moving around in her arms.

"Shh, shh." Kate tries again adjusting Ivy so her cheek falls over Kate's heart, head under her chin. Ivy starts to calm, her cries evening out to barely audible whimpers until all Kate can hear, is the sound of her light breathing. A rasp, as the tiny being quiets.

Jenny pokes her head into the living room, her eyes wide and her mouth slightly agape. "She asleep?" She asks.

Kate turns. "I don't know." She replies, continuing her rhythmic sway.

'Her eyes are open...Wow.. that's amazing.."

Ryan walks around, leaning on the door-frame. "You're a natural." He comments.

Kate's face falls subtly, and Jenny nudges him in the ribs. "Care to stay forever?" She asks with a laugh.

"Uh yea. since she won't settle for either of us."

"And we're her parents." Jenny says with an eye-roll.

Ryan nods, and steps back into the kitchen, the sound of plates sliding against each other is heard as he sets the table.

Kate just smiles, feeling her lips pull further and further at the corners.

"You good?" Jenny then asks.

Kate nods, her cheek rubbing against the top of Ivy's head.

Jenny pops back out, leaving Kate, who walks slowly around, swaying and bouncing. She's listening to the raspy inhales, feeling Ivy's tiny nails dig into the side of her arm, her other hand fisted at the middle of her chest.

Kate dips her head, brushing her nose against the side of Ivy's, and slowly sinks to the couch. She rests back against it, Ivy now curled up flat across Kate's chest. Kate's chin settles atop Ivy's soft brown hair, and her hand rises, smoothing along her soft cheek, and touching lightly at her ear, her nose, down her arm to her fist clenched at Kate's heart.

It beats for her. In a way no one, or anything else has been able to elicit. It's like magic. Something Kate hasn't felt since she was pregnant. And even before then, with Richard Castle. Since she met him, she's been open to the universe, and everything it has to offer.

And up until now, she's almost forgotten it.

Her hand stills on Ivy, and she sighs in the smell of this baby girl, not being able to get enough. Her heart flutters wildly in her chest as her entire body begins to sing at just the feel of this precious baby in her arms. Something she thought she would never get to feel again, would never get to experience.

But it's all right here, in the form of this tiny human being. It's transcendent, this feeling. A full body awareness, a soaring in her heart, in her soul, and it takes away everything. Heals everything just in this moment.

Ivy takes in a breathe, which flits across Kate's neck, and that feeling rises again, prickles at her skin in the most wonderful of ways.

With one arm under her, Kate lets her other hand drift down her back, rubbing up and down slowly. She can feel her warm against her, the rise and fall as Ivy breaths.

Closing her eyes, Kate begins to hum, letting the soft vibration lull them both into a trance...the baby stops curling her nails into Kate's arm at the sound, and begins to grow heavier, her breathing evening out as she falls asleep.

It's not long before Kate loses herself, there on the couch, a sleeping infant in her arms, and she soon falls into a daydream.

She may have missed out on this with her own baby girl.. the one she is going to find, but she has this now, with Ivy, and many other things she'll get to feel and witness when she finally has her own in her arms for the first time.


	20. Chapter Nineteen

_**Chapter Nineteen**_

Bell ascends the stairs, hearing a rhythmic back and forth shuffling of feet and a quiet mumbling as she gets closer. When she reaches the door, pushing lightly at it, it swings slowly open to reveal Autumn pacing the length of her room.

A little creature contemplating the means of escaping her cage.

She can see it in her eyes, that freedom Autumn has been seeking. How close she must be to it, it's in her sights, and now she just needs to figure out how to completely seize it. How to make it real.

At the cost of slicing a small hole in her own heart, Bell is going to help her. Is this not what she set out to do when she ventured into this life?

It's fulfilling.

Or it will be when this girl finally has what she deserves. Autumn has always been a mystery. Things come to her in ways that Bell doesn't think she'll ever grasp. Autumn feels differently, affected by the world so uniquely that Bell is often dumbfounded by the things she comes up with.

Bell might not understand it, this sudden prowl she seems to be doing upon her carpet. But it doesn't stop her from trying her best to stand by her.

"Hey tiger." She says, leaning on the doorframe and crossing her arms.

Autumn stops her steady pacing, looping around in a circle before standing still. "He wants to read my writing," she says so fast Bell doesn't quite get it all before Autumn starts to stalk about her room again.

"Whoa, whoa..wait a minute." She pushes off from the door and enters the forest of Richard Castle paraphernalia. "What are you talking about?"

"I met him.. at the library the other day.. and he read my poem in the paper. He said he really likes it, that I have talent and wants to read my other stuff." She spouts off, gesturing as she speaks. "What do you think this means?" She than asks, throwing her hands in the air.

Bell goes to open her mouth, her face twisted in utter confusion but she's cut off as Autumn brushes by her.

"I mean.. what if he likes all my writing? What if I get published?" She stops, twirling around on her heel and putting a finger to her lips. Her eyes grow wide then, "if I get published...then my parents will see...and if they see...then they will come find me."

"Wasn't that the point of publishing in the paper?" Bell asks, completely giving up on trying to decipher her babbling.

Autumn looks up at her. "Well yes..but...this is bigger!"

"It could be.. now calm down, and tell me who you met the other day...you know how I feel about strangers."

"He's not a stranger." Autumn says with an eyeroll hopping onto her bed. "And he's coming over." She bounces lightly on her covers, a smile creeping onto her face.

Bell stomps over, pulling Autumn by her arm until she's sitting, and then places both hands on her shoulders. "Will you _stop_ moving around and tell me what the _hell_you are talking about?" She scolds angrily, and slightly frightened by this girl's behavior.

Autumn looks over at her poster above her bed, her smile a now full out grin. "Richard Castle."

"Seriously?"

Autumn bites down on her lip and nods vigorously.

Bell drops her hands from Autumn's shoulders and takes a step back. "Richard Castle?"

"That's what I said." Autumn says, just about annoyed by Bell's sudden change from anger, to awe.

"And he's coming over?"

"Yes."

"Here?"

"No, we are going to meet at Remy's and discuss it over _coffee._" She says with a huge roll of her eyes.

* * *

><p>He can hear the sound of a ball bouncing on pavement. That beat beat as it's forced down, and then a small pause before it's either bounced again, or flying through the air. It hits the rim, followed by an "aw.." and then running feet as smaller bounces echo in the yard outside and then the roll, swish of grass.<p>

"Try again," Autumn says and he can picture her placing the little one into position.

He smiles, playing with the edge of a notebook as he continues to listen.

"I just can't _do _it." The little Raven replies, and he smiles further at remembering when he first heard about her. He was almost proud, for some reason. Autumn having named this little person after something in Edgar Allen Poe, piece.

Autumn sighs, "yes you can, throw it the other way then."

"But you said it looks stupid."

"It does..but you're obviously not tall enough yet to throw it the other way."

"Hey!" The little raven shouts in protest.

"I said _yet."_

He laughs, sifting pages through his fingers.

"They are characters aren't they?" He looks up, Bell has come back into the kitchen and opens up the fridge, pulling out a can of coffee. "Would you like some, Mr. Castle?"

"Yes. Thank you, and please call me Rick."

She smiles shyly at the thought and turns away to get a few mugs out. The girls continue to chatter outside, bouncing the ball and a few more misses before they are both shouting in celebration.

"Wooo." Rick cheers under his breath, just as the cabinet door closes with a soft whack, and Bell sits in a chair across the table from him. "Yes, they really are." He finally says, "especially Autumn."

Bell hums, nodding her head as she sits back in her chair, crossing her arms. She regards him with a critical eye. A mother's eye. "Can I as-"

"You have a lovely home." He cuts her off awkwardly. He knows what she's going to ask, and he's unsure if he has an answer that will fully explain himself. Because he is not entirely sure either.

Her brow creases and she tilts her head to one side. "Um, Thank you." she replies a bit put off.

"I envy your girls." He then says, for he never really had a house like this growing up.

She makes a face, and stands up from the table when to coffee maker beeps. "They aren't mine." She says, her back to him. She's quiet for a moment, and he turns slightly in his chair to watch her pour coffee into two mugs.

"Two sugars, please." He says as her hand reaches for the glass full of sugar.

"Cream?"

"Nice and light." He replies with a charming smile when she looks back at him. She returns it, if not tight lipped and puts the cream back in the fridge before sitting down with both mugs.

He watches her take a sip, her eyes finally meeting his as she swallows, "They are my foster children."

He nods his head, the kitchen going silent once more, except for the basketball outside, and the slide of his mug along the tabletop. "I count that as being a mother." He takes a long drink.

Bell lets her mug rest in one hand, "Hard to be, when one of them is hell bent on finding her real parents." She says sadly, looking down into her coffee, rubbing her thumb slowly along the rim.

"She's quite tenacious, that one." He remarks.

She nods, setting her cheek in her palm and glances towards the window. She sighs, looking back at him and opening her mouth to ask something.

"What's her story?" He cuts her off again, looking down at the stack of notebooks Autumn is letting him borrow.

"It's all about the story, isn't it Mr. Castle?"

"Well yes." He replies with a nod of his head, flipping through the pages. "There is always a chain of events, that makes everything make sense. Take you for example."

"What about me?"

"Exactly. Something must have happened in your life to make you chose this.."

Bell nods, with a purse of her lips. "But this is not about me."

Shaking his head Rick closes the notebook.

Bell sighs again, sliding one from the stack to rest in front of her, and circles her finger along Autumn's Name on the cover. "I can remember every single detail of that night." She starts, not meeting his gaze.

Rick leans back in his chair, giving her his full attention.

"Thirteen years ago. I was working full time at the Milmar Institute for orphaned girls." She looks out the window just as laughter from the girls filter in through on the spring air. "It was a crisp Autumn night...and I was just stepping out onto the porch, everything seemed still, and I..." She looks up at him. "I was so tired that day.. and I almost went back inside to sleep on one of the cots in the break room. But as I turned to go back inside... A cold breeze swept through the porch, casting leaves all over, and when it quieted, I heard the faintest sound."

He's transfixed, hearing the story of the young girl who has captured him. Blue eyes locked on this loving caregiver.

"I looked all around me, and spotted something on the bottom step, so I crept closer.. and there.. on the step, was a box covered in leaves. The pile moved, and I heard that sound again. Brushing the leaves aside, I saw her. Barely a day old..."

"Do you have any idea who left her?"

Bell shakes her head. "There wasn't even a note." She drinks a gulp of coffee and keeps it raised in both hands, elbows propped up on the table. "And it was then I went into fostering."

"Well, you have done a wonderful job with her, she is..." He trails of, leaning forward, not sure how to explain her.

"May I ask you something?"

"I'm an open book, ask away."

"Why Autumn?"

He almost chuckles at her bluntness. "I have been asking myself the same thing since I met her... And.. I don't know if you would understand even if I tried to answer."

"Try?"

Rick pushes his hand through his hair. "There is just..." Rick shakes his head, pursing his lips, "_Something _about her...I can't...put my finger on it...she reminds me of someone...and even a little of myself...I don't know.." He shakes his head again, feeling ridiculous.

Bell smiles. "No, I agree.. there is something about her.. something that drew me to her, drew me to this." She gestures around her kitchen, her house, her life. "Maybe you're right. Maybe there is a chain of events, that makes everything make sense... I am not sure what that is yet..."

"I have a feeling, it will be Autumn, who tells you." He says with a smile just as the little Raven comes running in, Autumn chasing after her.

"Give me that!" Autumn yells snatching at a news paper and finally getting it back when she corners the little one by the stove.

"She's not your mom you know!" The Raven mocks, sticking her tongue out.

"How do you know!"

"Girls!" Bell stands up stepping in between them. "What are you two on about?"

The Raven hides behind her legs, eying Rick for a moment before gripping at the back of Bell. "Autumn thinks her mom is in the paper."

"Can I see?" Bell asks, sticking out her hand to Autumn.

The thirteen year old looks between Bell and Rick, glaring at the annoying little creature in hiding, and tries to get out, dodging Bell and nearly getting past Rick who catches a 'help me." look from Bell, and manages to snag the paper.

"Hey!" Autumn tries to get it back, but he stands holding it high over her head. "Give it back!"

Rick looks to Bell.

"I'm sorry" She mouths, catching Autumns wrist. "Come with me." She scolds ushering the two out of the room as they shriek at each other.

Rick chuckles, sitting back down at the table and takes a hold of his coffee with one hand as he opens the paper with the other. "lets see what the fuss is about." He mumbles to himself, bringing his mug to his lips.

The mug clatters from his hand, spilling what's left of the contents all over the table, dripping onto the floor.

"Mr. Castle!" Bell runs in followed by the other two, "Are you okay?"

By now he's standing up, staring at the face on the front page of the New York Times, mouth agape.

"Rick?"

He looks up, closing his mouth and opening it again.. "I.. I have to go." He says quickly. "I'm sorry." He then adds as he rushes out the door.

* * *

><p>Her shadow guards along the far wall. A dark mass as it follows behind her stern steps, and it does not stop as she walks, more like stalks back and forth. Her eyes, dark and menacing, are fixed on her prey as she continues her prowl along the bars.<p>

Her nose flares, skin trembling with her determination. Her want.. this _need _she's been harboring for so long, she feels like she's about to leap out of her own skin. It's almost unbearable, this desperation, as she continues her constant turn and pace, turn and pace.

It drives her onward in the darkness, teeth clenched so tight in her jaw her mouth hurts but she doesn't care. Her only desire is the information, her goal, and her target is not talking. Or at least not _yet _, she will, once Kate figures out how to correctly approach the situation.

And all the while, during her hunt along the cell in holding, her prey sits and watches. Her dark eyes following the huntress, the lioness as she ponders her next move.

Kate can see her there in the shadows, watches as Simone shrinks further and further into her cot the longer Kate paces just out of reach. The silence is unnerving her. And the fact that Kate has kept herself in the darkness so this wretched woman cannot see her, has made this hunt even more worth it.

Because it's all about the timing, all about how she pounces on her.

She's waiting for her to be at her weakest, and then she will strike with the full force of Kate Beckett, the fighter, the warrior of justice. And now she will get _hers_.

Thirteen years.

She's waited _thirteen _years for this.

To get back what was taken from her, and damn it all if she's not going to do it right.

The echoing of determination suddenly stops. The air now thick with it, and a hush befalls the two of them. Simone jolts upright in her cot, eyes wide and suddenly extremely aware. As if she knows exactly what's coming. But nothing could prepare her for what grips at her heart, and she takes in a sharp inhale when Kate slowly, emerges from the darkness.

With a steady beat of her heart, Kate ascends on Simone's cage, wrapping her fingers in a tight hold around the bars, gripping until her knuckles turn white. Simone, pushes herself back against the wall, her entire body over taken by utter terror, as Kate, in one swift movement, yanks open the cell door, and pounces on her with such speed, Simone is thrown back.

The air leaves her body at the force of the impact. Kate's claws are in Simone's shirt as she holds her up against the cement wall, nose to nose with her target, teeth bared as her eyes dart dangerously between Simone's horrified ones.

Kate's prey trembles in her grasp, at the mercy of the lioness desperately searching for her cub. And she has nowhere to go...her eyes looking every which way, anywhere but into the eyes of the women whose life she left in ruins when they walked away, leaving her to die in those woods thirteen years ago.

Simone doesn't know what's more terrifying: This woman's intense gaze, or the fact that her lips start to curl up in a smile so sinister, she wishes for a death sentence. Anything than to be Kate Beckett's victim of vengeance.

It only takes three words, to reduces this human being, to a tiny defenseless animal. And she cracks, sinks low into the wall, deflating in the hunters hands when Kate finally speaks. Her words seep with malice, and pure desperation as she finally lets out a breath into Simone's face, sucking another one in before releasing it:

"Where. Is. She?"

* * *

><p><strong>Almost done...<strong>


	21. Chapter Twenty

_**Chapter Twenty**_

_After thirteen years, The 12th precinct has finally caught them. The Deliverers have been brought to justice by the talented work of NYPD's finest Det. Kate Beckett (left) and her team. Simone Potter a nurse at The Woman's Health Free clinic has been charged with the murder of two people, one of them, Forrest Jackman, who, like Potter, has been linked to the killings of several women in their baby napping operation over thirteen years ago._

Rick stands in the middle of his loft, the latest issue of the _New York Times _clutched in his trembling hand as he reads the article. His eyes dart to her picture every few milliseconds, and now, as he reaches the end, he cannot help but stare at her.

He's finally found her...

"Kate..." He whispers, his heart singing at the sound of her name on his own lips.

The woman who's haunted his dreams, who's buried herself deep in his soul, from the moment he laid eyes on her...She's right here. A detective for the NYPD.

"Darling?" His mother asks, she's been watching him stare at the photo of Kate... Kate Beckett., god, she finally has a name...

There is no air left in his lungs as he gazes upon her face. The one he never thought he'd see again. Running his finger along her cheek as she stares up at him from the page, he wishes he could actually feel her again. All he's had these many years later, is the ghost of her touch, the whisper of her lips upon his, and the fervor of her desires as it burned in those green/brown eyes.

"Kate." He says again, louder this time.

Rick would give anything to have it back. To have her.. all of her.

This mysterious woman.

Music beats in his ears, followed by that familiar thrum in his veins from that night. Rick closes his eyes, sees her in the throng of the other dancers, as if it's that very night, as if he's never left.

And their eyes meet just the same, his entire body, his soul jolting as if finally awakened...

She's flush against him, the blue and green lights flashing about them as they dance to the cosmic rhythm of fate. He can hear her, feel her all around him. Her hot breath in his ear as she spoke the only words he ever heard from those lips. And then the moans he elicited as he took them into his own mouth, tasted every inch of her, connected with her on a level he never thought possible...

It is possible, he realizes as he opens his eyes. Because he's always been drawn to her. Something has always brought him straight to her. Whether it be how she smelled, the color of her eyes...or just the epitome of her existence. The universe has been keeping her with him in the form of cherries...that tiny little fruit and he can bring her up in his mind just at the sight of them.

Coffee... how he could vaguely taste it on her kiss.

Green and browns...in.. Autumn's eyes... he still doesn't understand it.. but it's there.. in that girl...

He can't breathe. His heart leaping around in his chest as it tries desperately to tell him to go.

Move your feet, go to her!

His mother walks towards him, reaching a hand out and resting it upon his arm. "What are you going to do?"

He's frozen.. in shock.. or in terror he's not quite sure.. There's a difference between thinking about it, and actually doing it. He never thought this moment would come...He had moved on.. or so he thought.

But it seems now.. as his feet start to move slowly to the door, paper close to his face as he looks into her eyes.. that his dreams have not withered away. They have just been lying dormant in his heart. For his heart has always known that it would find her's again..

"Go get her dad." Alexis says from the stairs, leaning over the railing.

There is no further thought, as the paper drops from his hands, swishes to the floor, scattering every which way as he is opening the door. Running with everything he has in him, he speeds down the hallway, bypassing the elevator and taking the stairs.

Everything echos around him as he propels down the stairwells. His own heart hammers against his ribcage, his body vibrating with awareness. As if it knows. Knows that it is about to reconnect with it's lost soul-mate.

The only thing he can think about is seeing her face, whisking her off her feet and never letting her go again. She's worth it, he can feel it, he's known it since she disappeared from his life. He hasn't been the same since. He's never been more affected by anything or anyone in his entire existence, and that has to mean _something._

It means _Everything._

He would be a fool to let it slip away from him.

He has to go to her. He must relight the twin flame for which they had so serendipitously ignited together.

And has his feet hit the sidewalk down below, he heads straight for the 12th Precinct.

* * *

><p>"Let me go!" Autumn yells, trying desperately to yank her wrist free from Bell. They are battling in the kitchen, the little raven hiding behind the living room doorway as the two shriek at each other. The <em>New York Times <em>lays on the table, and Bell snatches it with her free arm, raising it up and shaking it furiously.

Bell holds firm, her hand wrapped around Autumn's skinny arm as the thirteen year old pulls with everything she has. "Autumn, listen to me."

"NO!" She's free, running though the kitchen and slamming the door behind her as she thumps onto the porch. But Bell is on her heels and grabbing her by the elbow.

"What do you think is going to happen Autumn? Huh? You think this woman is your mother?" She asks, pointing angrily at the photo of Kate Beckett. "How can you possibly know that!"

Autumn grasps the porch rail, using it as leverage as she continues to lean away from Bell. "I just know!" She yells back, eyes burning with finality. " I can.._feel _it."

"You can't always go on feelings Autumn, you have to have the facts... what if she isn't?"

"Don't say that!"

Bell throws the paper onto the porch, both looking down at it as the wind pushes it about, scattering the pages all over the place. "I'm just trying to prepare you...I don't want you to get your hopes up, if this..if this woman isn't who you're looking for." Bell stares into those fierce eyes, and then at the ones of the woman on the page before it flutters into the air and snags on the railing.

She won't admit it.. She just can't, that this Kate Beckett and Autumn look very much alike. For all she's wished for this intense human being before her...Bell never thought she would actually have to face the day when Autumn actually found them...She's become too attached. Autumn is hers in her mind, and she just cannot let her go..

"I have to go..." Autumn says more softly as she sees these emotions play across her foster mother's face. "_You _have to let me go."

Bell releases her, dropping her hands to her sides and looking away from the girl who's just aged ten years in under five minutes. "I can't let you." She says, her voice raspy.

Autumn stumbles down a step at the sudden freedom, and just stares. Glares at her until she's stunned into silence when Bell finally looks her in the eyes...tears streaming down her face. She chokes up, hand sliding from the railing and her chin dropping to her chest.

Bell has been everything to her. But she can't let her dreams slip away from her. She has to find her parents. And if Kate Beckett is in fact her mother.. then...Autumn is not sure what comes next. She's only ever dreamed about it.. Written about what it would be like.

She felt it the moment she laid eyes on the picture in the article. Her chest lit with a spark that traveled the length of her body. An all knowing she knew she couldn't ignore. It has to mean something.. to have affected her so greatly.. And she has to see this through, she needs to know for sure.

Now, faced with the reality that those dreams may come true. Autumn is frozen. Conflicted as she stands before the only person who's ever been a mother to her.

"Please." She finally asks, lifting her chin and meeting Bell's profile. "You have to let me just.. see."

"Then I will go with you."

She says nothing, ascending the steps and enveloping Bell in a tight embrace. Autumn waits until she un stiffens, wrapping her own arms around her. They stand there a long time until Autumn feels a small weight at her back and doesn't have to look to know it's The Raven.

This little human being she swore to loathe. For stepping into her territory, thinking she was going to change everything. But change is inevitable. It's something she's been striving for. Autumn just never thought herself afraid when the time actually came. And now cannot will herself to let them go, even though she pleaded for them to let _her _go.

Bringing an arm around, she presses the little one to her, all the while burying her face in Bells neck. Breathing in the life this woman has given her. And even though, this is just a chance, just a look see at the possibilities of Kate... Autumn knows deep down.. that this is it.

And then, all at once, they let her go, "Let me just get the keys." Bells says, wiping her eyes.

Autumn waits until the door shuts, and then she's running. Down the porch steps and across the lawn, until she reaches her bike. She doesn't look back, as she peddles off down the street, doesn't listen as Bell comes back out, yelling for her.

She lifts her face into the wind, feeling the pull of what she knows to be the universe. This _is _it. Everything leading up till this moment has prepared her for what's to come. She's felt it in the air, heard it in the whispers of the city.

And now she is going to seize it for her own.

She lets herself smile, brown/green eyes open to every possibility as she heads towards the 12th precinct.

* * *

><p>She could kill that woman, for what she just told her. After all of that.. after all she put Kate through thirteen years ago. Kidnapping her, taking her baby and leaving her to die. Leaving her to suffer all this time without knowing that her child was alive. All of that, and she ended up in an orphanage.<p>

Kate doesn't understand.

What was the reason behind all this? Is there some sort of.. cosmic plan that has finally fallen into place. And why now. Why after all this time and not then?

She rests back against the railing in an abandoned stairway, chest heaving and eyes burning as she tries to will herself to keep moving. Go find her. She knows where she is...but there is always that fear, like she's had before.

Before she was afraid of not being able to get her back. Kate has always known she was alive, but she didn't know if she could get her back if she was with a family. Because of course that is where she would be. That's what Forrest and Simone did, sold the babies to wanting families. And her baby girl would have grown up not knowing that her mother was waiting for her.

And now.. the fear has transformed into something new. Her child has grown up, probably thinking Kate didn't want her. That she was given up, abandoned. Would she even want to go back to Kate, or has she been adopted?

Living the life she should have had with Kate...

All of these things run through her mind. Stopping her from doing the one thing that has driven her all these years. Rising up from the wall, she straightens, taking in a breath before taking a step.

No, she cannot let her fears stop her from living the life she knows she deserves. From getting back what was taken from her. And with each step, one quicker than the last, Kate can actually feel her daughter calling out to her.

It's unmistakable.

They have _always _been eternally linked. She's always been able to feel her. It's how she's known she's alive. They're souls are connected in a way Kate has only ever experienced once in her life. And even that is different.

Kate feels it in her veins, the pumping of blood to her heart and reawakening the fire she thought had been extinguished. But as she runs down the remaining steps, not being able to get down them fast enough, she finally lets that smile spread across her face.

Those green/brown eyes of hers light up in a way they haven't since she was pregnant. She can see her, imagine what she'll be like now more than ever as she reaches the last step, pushing with everything she has against the door and stumbling into the lobby.

And when she reaches the front entrance, Kate feeds that fire in her as she steps out into the sun of New York City. There is a lightness in her heart, and an excitable thrum in her veins at the knowledge that she will be seeing her daughter again.

* * *

><p>Autumn leaps off her bike, leaning it up against the wall of an alley near the precinct. Her heart is fluttering madly in her chest, and she clasps a hand over it, as if trying to quiet it. But she knows she can't, moving out of the shadows of the alley, and into the bright hot sun.<p>

She's not paying attention, walking down the sidewalk with her eyes solely on her destination. And when she sees it, she lets out a gasp and she runs blindly the rest of the way. She's so busy staring up at the giant pillars, and then the carved _12th Precinct _just over the entrance, imagining what her mother must be like, working in this place, being a NYPD detective, Autumn runs right into something solid.

"Omph!"

She stumbles back nearly tripping on the bottom step leading into the precinct. Her eyes travel up as someone grabs onto her elbow, and her eyes soon look into the sharp blues of Richard Castle.

"Hey!" She chirps excitedly, righting herself.

"Oh.. hey Autumn." He replies, shifting from one foot to the other and looking at the doors and back at her.

"Don't worry about before." She says in a hurry turning to climb the stairs.

He reaches out again, taking her by the shoulder. "What's the rush?" He asks.

Autumn stares back at the doors. "I'm here to see someone." She says pulling away from him a little, eager to get inside, she can't wait much longer.

"Me too." He says. "Who are you going to see, we can go in together."

"My mother."

"Your mother?"

"Yes!" She hops on the balls of her feet, throwing her head back around to the doors once again. "I found her!"

Rick's brow creases in confusion, and he kneels down, placing both hands on either of her shoulders. "What do you mean you found her?"

"She's in the paper.. I have to go see her.. " She steps away from him, going up a few stairs before he follows.

"Wait a minute Autumn.. you don't know this woman, who is she?"

"Detective Kate Beckett." She replies reaching a hand for the door just as it opens.

"Wait what!" He practically yells yanking her down the steps before someone hits her with it.

"Let go!"

"Rick?"

Rick's heart ceases, and he freezes, dropping his hand from Autumn. "Kate." He whispers.

"Wha...what are you doing here?" Kate asks taking the remaining steps down to him.

Autumn gasps, and she finds she has no words what so ever. Here she is, standing before her, and her heart is imploding in her chest.

"I'm...here to see you...I..." Just like the girl beside him, he's lost the capabilities to speak.

Kate bites down on her lip, looking at him, and then down at the girl next to him who's also biting her lip. "I need to go.. but ah-"

"Where are you going, I'll get you a cab."

She shakes her head. "I'm...so sorry." She then says brushing past him to get to her car. "Rick.. I." She stops at the car, turning around to see him standing there dumbfounded, and the girl just, biting down on her lip, big green eyes wide and looking between them.

He frowns, stepping over to her and leaving Autumn to stare stunned. "What for?"

Kate hangs her head. "Something happened...after we met...it's.. a long story but I'm..on my way somewhere..I need to go." She opens the door, stepping off the curb to get inside and then stops. "Come with me."

Rick looks behind him at the girl, and back at Kate. "Well I...where?"

Kate worries her lip between her teeth again, shuts her door and moves to him, taking him by the hand and looking into those blues that have forever changed her. "I'm sorry." She says again. "I am so sorry that I didn't tell you.."

He leans closer to her, not being able to stay away any longer, and brings a hand to her cheek. "Tell me what?" He asks, voice soft, tender like he's always dreamed of being with her.

She feels as though they have always done this, that there has not been years and years between them. Eyes fluttering a little, Kate leans into his palm,"...I'm going to find...my dau- baby...well our baby." She then says, pulling him to the car.

"Wait!"

Both Kate and Rick whip around to find Autumn standing alone on the sidewalk.

"You don't have to go." Autumn says, taking a few sure steps forward.

Kate looks at her curiously. "Why not?"

"Because... I have _always _been right here."

* * *

><p><strong>That's the last chapter.. But don't worry! I will have an epilogue up soon.<strong>

**Thank you, my dear readers for sticking with me the entire time.. and reviewing for those who did...please, let me know what you think.. for I feel mixed emotions about this ending.. and I just hope, you all liked it.  
><strong>


	22. Epilogue

**Disclamier: I do not own any of the characters from _Castle. _Only the ones I have created myself.. so yes Autumn is mine.  
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**A/N: Seeing as this is the end.. I would like to thank **Monkeywand** for betaing a few of these chapters... Jerryst316.. for being here for the beginning of this Journey.. and of course my lovely kimmiesjoy.. for being my sounding board and sticking with me for the end :D  
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><p><em><strong>Epilogue<strong>_

In New York City, a man and a woman wake from a night of peaceful slumber. They lead universally interconnected lives, twined together by the same string of cosmic relief. And despite the complexities life has thrown at them in the past, the universe has a way of turning things around.

They are quite aware that their lives have intersected for a greater purpose, in a way they had never expected. It's because of their choices, the events in their lives, the paths they took, or were forced to travel; that led them straight here.

It may not have felt like a great triumph at the time.. for there was great suffering. It was hard to see the bigger picture, that those tough choices had fogged over. In the end, they have come to realize that it was their product of these choices, that was really just a new beginning to the journey that had brought them here and now.

Fate has a way of linking people together in ways we might never understand...But as the woman turns over in bed, into the warmth she'll never want to leave again, she smiles in the knowledge that everything has finally come together, and she wouldn't change one thing.

Not if it has led her here.

The light of the sun peeks in through the curtains, and she buries in, not ready for a new day.. it's deliciously warm where she lays, the body she shares her bed with gives her all the comfort, stability his arms will always hold her in... making it that much harder to slip out of bed and into the chilly air of their bedroom.

Her bare feet hit the floor with a soft thud, and she looks back at the bed, letting her hand rest on his foot peeking out from the sheets. Biting down on her lip, she reluctantly leaves the bedroom, the memories of last night sending pleasant shivers down her spine.

"Mmm, Kate," she hums as she lifts her shoulders on another shiver, dropping them down with a delicious sigh as she stares at herself in the mirror of her spacious bathroom.

Her green eyes stare back. Brilliant and bright, illuminating her flecks of brown with an irreplaceable spark. She feels euphoric as she smiles at the glow of her skin, the way her eyes smile back at her. Pure evidence of her restful nights and relaxation.

Among other things...

Her brown hair lays fizzy and knotted around her face, and she tucks it all behind her ears, feeling the soft texture. She makes a face in disgust when her fingers get caught, and leans closer to the mirror. Blinking a few times, she just stares at herself. This once unidentified woman. She knows exactly who she is. With everyday the past year becoming more vivid and real, Kate thinks she's finally found herself. She's more than sure now. And she's more than willing to fight for her, than she was before. For there is more hope now than there ever was.

A sound from her room startles her. She freezes, fingers still knotted in her hair, while her eyes snap to the door. She listens, hearing the bed springs and then a moan, a long drawn out hum, then nothing. She lets her hands drop to the sink with a sigh before shaking her head at herself over her jumpy heart, and then tip toes to open the door a crack.

She's back at the sink. Listening for more sounds, and then refocuses on her reflection. Her hands rest on the counter as she leans in until her nose touches the cold glass. Her eyes unfocused and refocus, but she still looks the same. The same well rested, satisfied Kate. And she won't ever change that. Her life is everything, and she hasn't come this far for nothing.

She certainly hasn't...

She sighs. Closing her eyes for the briefest of moments as if to remind herself, opening them, she knows she never will forget. Giving herself a little wink in the mirror she turns pulling a fresh green towel from her cabinet. Holding it to her face, she breathes in the smells of her everyday life. The mixtures of her and him that have seeped into the fabric, mingling together as one entity. It soothes her beyond belief, making her eyes close involuntarily.

It's the building heat in her belly and steam of the shower that wakes her. With another contented sigh, hopefully never the last one for the rest of her life, she places her towel on the rack next to his, running her hands along both before she climbs into the shower. As the hot water trickles down her sated body, Kate hopes that the relief of her life will stay itself beyond the forgotten wall. She lets her head fall back into the stream and smiles, realizing after a moment that it's more than likely.

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><p>He stirs, the cosmic pull of events still tightly wrapped around him as he wakes, and turns over blinking his eyes at the little bit of light peeking in from the window. It casts a soft glow across the bed, along the other side which lays empty. He pulls his arm from under his pillow, letting it slide until his hand rests in the dip of the vacant space, and he smiles at the fact that it's still warm. Although, he would rather be reaching for the warmth of the body once there, than the space now getting cold.<p>

He stretches, moaning loudly into the room, and then turns into the space, breathing in her scent and humming as the flutter of her memory enters his chest. After a moment he lifts his head at the sound of the shower turning on, and no longer wishes to stay in bed all day. Feeling like it's not worth it. Not if she's not here with him.. and not if she's there in the shower.. alone.. And he does eventually move, and not at all reluctantly slips out from under the space only his warmth provides and out into the cold air of their bedroom.

His bare feet hit the floor beneath, and he nearly trips over himself, the sheets holding him hostage around his calf. He disentangles himself looking to the door cracked open for him as he makes his way to his bathroom. Rubbing a hand over his face, and into his messy brown hair, he watches the silhouette in the shower before he turns to his reflection in the mirror. Smiling, he leans in a little closer.

"Morning, Rick," he hears behind him, and the sweet sound awakens him further.

His blue eyes shine brighter, darkening at her voice, making them more piercing, condoning the fun loving man she's made him realize he's always been. When did this happen? He shakes his head, his hair falling in a mess over his forehead, and if possible his grin widens. As a feeling of contentment that washes over him and he rubs at his growing stubble, the one she finds sexy.

Rick wonders if it will ever change, if he will ever lose that man he's finally found. But Rick knows more than anything that he will never get lost in all the jumbled expectations again.

He hears a sound from upstairs, and he pauses, his hand still on his scruff, while his eyes look towards the door. He listens, hearing a slow tired thump of feet descending the stairs, but nothing else over the rush of the shower. He lets his hand drop to the counter, with a sigh, and a glance back at the frosted glass behind him he pads to the door, closing it, and then pressing the lock, before he turns back to the mirror.

Rick stays still for another moment, and when there is no knock at either door, he relaxes. He looks curiously at himself, waiting for... something. But nothing happens. He still looks like the same emotionally and physically exuberant Rick. And some of that if not every ounce, will manifest. For he has a family that is dear to him, that depends on him a great deal.

His everything...

He sighs, closing his eyes for a small moment, as if to hold it close, not wanting to let it go. But he really doesn't have to, for when he opens them and turns around, Rick realizes that it's not going anywhere.

Watching the form behind the frosted glass, he picks up a soft blue towel from the rack next to hers, holding it to his face. It feels nice against his skin, perfectly satisfied and relaxed. It soothes his entire being even further as he breathes it in.

It smells like _them_.

He hums, placing it back, and running his fingers along the green one before stepping into the steam of the shower already fogging up the mirrors. He hopes as he finds his place in there with her, that everyday will continue on with this bliss. And as she turns around to face him, he finds that more than likely.

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><p>Wiping the fog from the mirror, Kate secures the towel around herself, somewhat, if not teasingly avoiding his gaze as her hair drips, the heat of the bathroom pushing the droplets along her skin, and drawing his eye.<p>

She stands beside him at the sink, and smiles at him in the mirror as they reach for their toothbrushes at the same time. He turns on the faucet, and she grabs their toothpaste. Sticking his out, she squirts the paste onto his, and then hers, and they both pop them into their mouths in sync, and begin brushing their teeth.

It's a morning ritual. Gooey eyes through the mirror, the occasional light shove, and her famous glare when he accidentally spits on her toothbrush...There is no small talk, no banter as they get ready for their day together. Just the silent talk through the mirror. All with their eyes and lightness of touch.

With a wink, and a hand trailing along his shoulders, she gives him a wicked smile before dropping her towel, and sauntering into their bedroom to get dressed. She knows he will follow, after he picks his toothbrush off the floor, his mouth agape as it slides from his mouth and bounces of the sink.

She pulls back the curtains when she walks out of the bathroom, feeling as the last droplets dry on her skin. The bed is all rumpled with the covers drawn back, some having slipped off the bed, and she grins.. Smiling further when she hears someone banging around in the kitchen, and goes about her morning ritual.

The smell of cherries fills the space around her as she stands at her dresser. Pulling out a few articles of clothing, she throws them onto the bed already shimmying into her jeans and heading back to the dresser when he stumbles into the bedroom.

"Kaaaaate." He whines, stepping up behind her and lets his bare chest rest against her back.

She lets her hands rest lightly on the top of the dresser with a shake of her head. She just can't help it. He's just too adorable for his own good.

Kate wipes a hand over her eyes, needing coffee before she starts to get a headache, and lifts the lid of her small jewelry box. She delicately lets her fingers dance across her mother's ring, the cold metal glimmers in the sunlight as she lifts it, sending a shiver through her body, as if she can feel her mother's presence. Kate feels Rick wrap his arms around her middle and she stares at the ring before letting it rest back in it's proper place. Taking in a deep breath she then drops her eyes back to the box. Her father's watch. She leaves that too, instead, reaching in and taking out her wedding ring.

"Rick." She replies teasingly, turning and slipping her ring onto her finger, before poking him in the chest with it. "You know we cannot keep her waiting much longer."

At that, they both hear a crash from the kitchen.

Kate quirks her eyebrow, biting down on her lip as if to prove a point.

Rick sighs, letting his forehead fall to her shoulder. "I know.. she's probably going crazy..." He says taking in a breath. "But..." He kisses her shoulder. "You smell..." and then her neck. "Delicious."

She closes her eyes, tilting her head and letting out a soft whimper. "Later.. I promise." She says, weaving her hand into his hair and lightly pulling him away.

"That's what you said last night..." He pouts stepping away in search of his jeans.

"Mm... I did, and what would you call that?" She asks, nudging her head towards the shower.

He looks at her, a mischievous crinkle in his eyes as he jumps a bit into the air as he pulls on his jeans, and then does his belt. "Part one?" He asks with an adorable shrug.

"Oh.. that's cute." She rolls her eyes, pinching his cheek before gathering her shirt and pulling it on over her head.

"Hey, a man can dream." He replies sheepishly as he pulls her in by the waist, planting a kiss on her cheek.

She smiles, kissing him properly and pulling back, a hands cupping his ears, "And so can a little girl." She then says, tugging one ear before opening the bedroom door.

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><p>She stands in the middle of the kitchen, hand on one hip, lip worried between her teeth as she looks at what she's done. It's a disaster zone, despite the perfect looking breakfast plates set neatly on the dining room table.<p>

Wiping her hands on her jeans, she hums into the space around her, ears pricking when she hears a door open, and then mumbles in another room. Where to start.. where to start.. It's one thing to make the mess and quite another to clean it up, especially given the fact that she hasn't much time to do so before she's busted.

Okay.. maybe the flour.. which is... all over the counter, sprinkled on the floor, her jeans.. a bit in her hair.. oh man she is soo busted...Pushing her hand into her hair, she finally moves, ushering the flower into a pile, and then dumping it into the sink, which she then rinses away.. getting rid of the evidence...hmmm okay soo maybe she freaked out.. this is not so bad. Now just.. fill up the sink and put the dirty dishes in...and..

CRASH!

Her eyes scrunch as she cringes at the sound, looking back to make sure no one is coming out to investigate as she hurriedly finshes up. Standing back, she looks at her handy work and then frowns..maybe it's too clean... they will suspect. She could always just-

"Ahem."

She spins around, loose hair from her ponytail slipping into her face, which she blows away with the corner of her mouth, "uh, hey guys..." She replies sheepishly, seeing her mother standing in the doorway to the study, one hand on her hip, her father right behind her with a goofy grin on his face.

"Made a mess didn't you?" Her mother asks, stepping into the kitchen.

"Oh but look!" Her father exclaims, rushing over to the dining room table. "She made breakfast!" Then his face falls when he sees the smiley face made out of whipped cream, blueberries for eyes.. and an umbrella in the orange juice glasses.

He turns his head slightly, eyes wide and curious, "what do you want?"

"Nothing!" She protests, looking between the two of them. "I swear!" She then adds when neither budge nor seem to believe her.

"Autumn." Her mother says taking her by the elbow and leading her to the table, and sitting her down. "You don't have to make a mess, and an elaborate breakfast when you want to ask us something."

"I didn't make a me-"

Her mother wipes flour off her cheek, showing her with a little smirk before kissing her forehead. "Umm." Autumn said shrugging her shoulders.. "I love you?"

"No harm done, Kate." They hear behind them, both looking to see he has a mouthful of smiley face waffles. "These are good!"

Both laugh, "we love you too, now." Kate kisses Autumn on the cheek before pulling out a chair beside her. And yet, nobody speaks, as Kate digs into her happy food, all the while Autumn is looking between them, seeing the grin and sparkle of their eyes mirrored on both her parents faces.

"Rick." Kate shoves him lightly and nudges her head towards their anxious daughter.

He reluctantly puts down his fork, licking the whipped cream off his top lip, and leans with both arms on the table. "I have been thinking." He starts.

"Excuse me?"

"We.. WE have been thinking."

"Well first off." Autumn cuts them off, wiggling in her chair. "Can I just say.. I want to go see Bell today? But it's not because of the other thing.. and it's not like... my way in like.. hinting it's the other thi-."

"Slow down, my little detective." Kate says with a laugh.

"It's about Bell." Rick then adds.

"It is?" Autumn straightens in her chair, eyes alight, more green than brown. "Wait a minute." She then says, voice falling flat and she starts to narrow her eyes at them. "You already decided this.. like.. a while ago didn't you?" She accuses.

Rick and Kate look at each other and then back at Autumn. Both nod.

"That's just cruel." Autumn gets up from the table, pouting all the while.

Rick laughs..."You _are _my mother.. sit down.."

"So dramatic.. I think she gets that from you." Kate pipes in.

"That may be.. but she definitely got that glare from you." He says, pointing at Autumn who stands with her arms crossed. "And that cute crease between the eyes.. just not when they are both aimed at me."

Both brunettes roll their eyes at him. "Can we get to the point?" Autumn asks, flopping back into her chair, pushing her own smiley face so it has a crooked mouth.

"Yes! the Point!" Rick says with one finger in the air. "Is that We, as in.. all of us." He gestures between all three of them. "Are Going to see Bell today... to.. well...You'll know when we get there."

Autumns mouth hangs open, her heart starting to flutter excitedly in her chest. But then her mouth closes and she schools herself. "Good." She nods. "because I told Robin I would go see her...that I would come back for her..." She then mumbles.

Rick and Kate share another look. "Finish your breakfast, and then we will go." Kate says.

Autumn stares at them.. not quite sure exactly what they are getting at.. but they are acting suspicious... After another moment, her father going back to his food, and her mother tipping her glass to her lips while avoiding her glares, Autumn starts eating her breakfast.

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><p>Cars rush by in a blur, the city changing as they move along through it. Buildings turning to houses, neighborhoods parks and trees.<p>

The car ride is quiet.. at least in the back seat as Kate drives.. Rick complaining all the way that she never lets him, followed by a constant, yet comforting bicker that somewhat keeps Autumn less anxious.

She's used to it by now...having gotten to see their relationship blossom as they all began to share a life together around the same time...She heard, somewhat how they met, both recounting how it was the universe that had brought them together.. all of them.

Autumn really didn't need to be told. She already knew.. Her entire life was wrapped around the dreams of the one she is finally living... And it's lived up to her expectations and more... Her mom is everything she dreamed she would be and more, they are more alike than she thought.

He's funny, and childish, not that she hadn't already known. She had known him before she realized...

All three of them are able to hold a bickering match for hours. Although, Autumn usually always takes her mothers side, only because it's more fun to see her father's reaction, that pout he gets on his face, and the way her mother soothes it away.

They have a relationship Autumn dreams for herself. It's magical.. and .. transcendent. The way they have come together after all this time.. Acting as though they had never been apart.

It's truly extraordinary.

But on this particular car ride, all she can think about is the look on her little raven's face when she left Bell's for good... Climbing into the back of Kate's crown vic with all her things...Bell on the front porch, tears in her eyes as she waved her off.. and Robin.. face pushed to the upstairs window.

Autumn had carried a mixture of emotions that day.

She had gotten attached to the little raven after a while.. even after Autumn had finally found her parents...gone through all the necessary details before she was allowed to go home with them...The last thing she said to her, was that she was going to come back for her...

That was months ago... And Autumn knew that Robin didn't believe her... it's been too long.. and even at the wedding, Robin had refused to look at her.. as if she had left her behind...Forgotten her.

But she didn't. Never.

Aside from getting to know her parents, adjusting to life in the loft.. all the attention from the paparazzi... Autumn never stopped thinking about her. For.. she had grown on her... Autumn realized.. that the little raven was just as lost as she had once been. They were looking for the same things. And Yes.. Robin had Bell...Just like she herself once did. But there was something in her eyes, those dark brown reassuring eyes, that told her she needed her.

"Autumn?" Kate snaps her back to attention, her body turned so she could looks into the backseat.

"Hmm?" She asks, looking around her. Realizing that they were in the driveway of her old home of thirteen years.

"We're here.. but we wanted to ask you something before we went in." Rick says, also turned around.

She frowns, confused but nods, "okay?"

"Are you sure?" They both say at the same time.

"About what?"

"About the Little Raven." Rick says.

So this is why they are here.. not just for a visit.. but to bring her home with them...

Tears spring to Autumn's eyes as she nods her head vigorously and starts to unbuckle her seatbelt. "Does she know?" She asks, as she fights with the buckle. Fingers desperate and frantic..

"She does." Kate says just as Autumn breaks free, launching herself out of the car.

"Robin!" She shrieks, slamming the door behind her and running to the porch.

The door swings open, revealing Bell, holding her latest foster kid, a small baby boy. Robin, pokes her head around Bells legs, looking at the three standing in the doorway. She then looks up at Bell, who nods her head, a smile on her face.

The little Raven flings herself down the porch and into Autumn's waiting arms. "I knew you would come back for me!" She whispers into her hair.

Autumn wraps her arms around her tightly, smoothing her hand down the back of her head. "Always." She whispers. "Always."

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><p><strong>THE END<strong>

**Thank you all who have read/reviewed for coming along this journey with me :D  
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